From ZEEP to Nature Connect
Twenty-five years ago a small idea took root on the banks of Zeekoevlei in Cape Town. It was called the Zeekoevlei Environmental Education Programme, and known to everyone as ZEEP.
That idea grew into the Cape Town Environmental Education Trust, and eventually into the organisation known today as Nature Connect.
What started as a single community programme became a body of work spanning education, youth development and conservation across the country. The focus has held steady: connect people to nature, build skills over time, and make sure those skills turn into work that lets communities look after the places around them.
A child’s first experience may come through a school lesson or an overnight camp. For some, that moment becomes the beginning of a lifelong connection. They return as teenagers, then as young adults, stepping into roles that require them to take responsibility for the same places that first shaped how they saw the world.
- 1AccessAccess to nature changes what a child thinks is possible.
- 2ExposureRepeated exposure builds understanding.
- 3TrainingStructured training builds competence.
- 4WorkA job makes it stick.
“Twenty-five years in this work has taught us that if we can build people’s connection to nature, and create opportunities for them to tangibly benefit from its protection, then we have the greatest chance of securing it for coming generations.”Dr Anthony Roberts Chief Executive Officer
Twenty-five years, in order
- 2001
The Zeekoevlei Environmental Education Programme begins on the banks of Zeekoevlei.
- 2006
The programme becomes the Cape Town Environmental Education Trust.
- 2007
Our conservation fund is established, and the first skills development work begins.
- 2013
The Conservation Leadership Project starts its first seven-year cohort.
- 2021
The organisation becomes Nature Connect Trust.
- 2022
Restoration of the eighteenth century homestead at Bokbaai completes, and camps begin running there.
- 2023
The schools programme joins the UNESCO Greening Education Partnership.
- 2025
Twenty River Wardens graduate with a Nature Conservation qualification, and the 2019 Conservation Leadership cohort completes its seventh and final year.
- 2026
Nature Connect marks twenty-five years of changing lives through nature.
Twenty-five years shows in the people
Three of them came to us as children and are still here.
“In 2007 I attended a camp at False Bay Ecology Park. I was in Grade 9, and for the first time I saw a career.”
Returned through a youth development opportunity, completed a Nature Conservation learnership, and has since introduced thousands of children to nature as one of our educators.
“My journey began in 2014 at my first overnight camp. That experience sparked my passion for nature and my place within it.”
Selected for the Conservation Leadership Project in Grade 6, now studying accounting while working as a part-time environmental educator and mentoring the next conservation leaders.
“My life started when I started working with Nature Connect and I could see a bright future.”
One of the first skills development participants. Came through a capacity development programme and several pilots, and today supervises and supports young women through their own learnerships.
The next Christyline, Anwar or Jumah is sitting in a Grade 6 classroom somewhere in this city, waiting on a first camp.
Get people in Africa to love and protect nature.
VisionPeople in Africa are connected to nature and act as its stewards, benefitting from an expanding green economy.
We work at three leverage points: schools that can carry environmental work themselves, young people moving into green economy jobs, and urban conservation sites managed with the people who live beside them. Each one feeds the next.
Eight provinces: Western Cape, Northern Cape, Eastern Cape, Free State, KwaZulu-Natal, North West, Gauteng and Limpopo.
Two anchor sites. Cape Town for camps, schools and training. Calvinia for youth conservation training, in the Succulent Karoo.
The Board of Trustees
Nature Connect Trust is governed by a voluntary Board of Trustees that provides strategic direction, oversight and accountability.
Nicole BiondiChairpersonIndependent consultant and leadership coach. Twenty years in communications across tourism, conservation and social impact, including Cape Town Tourism and SANParks.
Mike GregorTrusteeChief Executive of Rapula Farming, a business linked to conservation initiatives across South Africa. Has served on several environmental education boards.
Stephen GrangerTrusteeLand surveying and environmental studies at UCT. Fifteen years heading the environmental management unit at Ninham Shand, then environmental strategy at the Cape Metropolitan Council.
Pavitray PillayTrusteeMSc in Marine Biology, UCT. Head of Business Development and Marketing at WWF-SA. SANCOR science communicator of the year in 2010 and International Ocean Witness in 2018.
David de KorteTrustee, retired ChairpersonA founding member of Nature Connect and on the Board ever since. Retired Education Programme Coordinator at Common Good, and previously headmaster of Camps Bay High School.