Photo of Rafael  Hoogesteijn Rafael Hoogesteijn
Panthera, 8 West 40th Street, 18th Floor
10018 New York, USA
rafhoogesteijn(at)gmail.com

member since 1986
I graduated as DVM from the Faculty of Veterinary Sciences at the Central University of Venezuela in 1978 and later earned a Masters degree in Wildlife Management and Conservation at the University of Florida in Gainesville (USA). Over the course of more than 30 years, I have been dedicated to private practice and research in beef cattle and buffalo dual-purpose herds, and the management of feline-predation problems in livestock, principally in the Llanos and the Pantanal floodplain areas. I have been a member of the Cat Specialist Group of IUCN since 1986, I also served as an adviser to the Wildlife Conservation Society. I am working with Panthera since 2008 in Brazil, as Supervisor of Panthera Brasil and of the Jaguar Conservation’s Panthera Ranch: Fazenda Jofre Velho and as Director of the Jaguar/Cattle Conflict Program in Brazil and throughout Latin America, with the different local Panthera Teams. My experience and extensive number of publications have shown that the production of beef cattle and buffaloes is possible and profitable, in conjunction with jaguar and wildlife conservation and tourism, in the neotropical flooded savannas and other neotropical biomes.