About NAMCOB

Elected Member

Jess Phillips

Jess Phillips serves as the Director of Animal Facilities at the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore, USA, where he oversees Penguin Coast, the largest African Penguin breeding colony in North America. He is also the Vice-Coordinator for the Association of Zoos and Aquariums’ (AZA) African Penguin Saving Animals From Extinction (SAFE) program. Jess collaborates closely with partners in Namibia and South Africa to strengthen wildlife disaster preparedness and emergency response efforts.

Seabird Ranger

Kaurimbi Mberirua

Namibian Foundation for the Conservation of Seabirds (NAMCOB)
Kaurimbi Mberirua holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Natural Resource Management and has two years of field experience with NAMCOB, contributing to seabird conservation and coastal ecosystem management. With a strong background in wildlife monitoring, ecological research, and community engagement, Kaurimbi brings hands-on experience from both terrestrial and marine conservation settings. His skills include ecological data collection, species monitoring, and environmental outreach, supporting NAMCOB’s efforts to protect Namibia’s marine biodiversity.

Treasurer

Hendrina Januarie

Hendrina Januarie, NAMCOB’s Treasurer, is a development practitioner with a strong background in community-driven initiatives. Previously with the Debmarine-Namdeb Foundation, she offers deep insight into sustainable community engagement. She holds multiple qualifications, including a Bachelor’s in Business Administration (HR) and an Honours in Business Management, supporting NAMCOB’s commitment to financial sustainability and inclusive development.

Elected Member

Dr Jessica Kemper

Dr. Jessica Kemper is a seasoned conservation biologist whose passion for seabirds—particularly African Penguins. In the late 1990’s, she monitored seabirds on Dassen Island and volunteered regularly at SANCCOB. Her pivotal experience came in 1999 when she “island-sat” Mercury Island near Lüderitz, where she now resides over two decades later. Jessica completed a PhD in African Penguin demography and voluntarily managed the local seabird rehabilitation centre under the African Penguin Conservation Project. From 2008–2010, she served as Seabird Scientist with Namibia’s Ministry of Fisheries and Marine Resources before transitioning to freelance conservation work. She remains deeply committed to the conservation of coastal seabirds and their habitats, combining field expertise with long-term advocacy and rehabilitation efforts.

Namibian Chamber of Environment (NCE)

Dr Chris Brown

Dr. Chris Brown is a conservation biologist and ecologist with over 40 years of experience in environmental management, biodiversity conservation, and strategic programme development. He founded Namibia’s Directorate of Environmental Affairs and contributed to the drafting of environmental clauses in the Namibian Constitution. Formerly Executive Director of the NNF, he now serves as CEO of the Namibian Chamber of Environment. He holds a PhD in Conservation Biology and has led numerous national conservation initiatives.

Chairperson

Angus Middleton

Angus Middleton, serving as Chairperson, brings over 20 years of senior leadership experience across Africa and Europe. With a background in environmental economics and ecological resource management, he currently leads the Namibia Nature Foundation and provides strategic oversight to NAMCOB’s conservation and marine protection work.

Operations Manager

Neil Shaw

Namibian Foundation for the Conservation of Seabirds (NAMCOB)
Neil oversees strategic operations, project management, and the integration of community-led conservation initiatives at NAMCOB. With a background in Third World Development and Economics, he brings extensive experience in organisational development, institutional governance, and operations leadership across southern Africa. Over the years, Neil has supported public authorities and conservation partners with policy development, capacity building, and programme design. He now applies this experience to strengthening NAMCOB’s operational systems, institutional governance, and the delivery of its seabird conservation programmes, helping the organisation build lasting capacity to protect Namibia’s coastal and marine biodiversity.

Assistant Seabird Technician

Petrus Shiindi

Namibian Foundation for the Conservation of Seabirds (NAMCOB)
Petrus joins the team with a strong background in animal handling and maritime work. He brings five years of experience as a dog handler and has also worked as a deck-hand on commercial fishing vessels. Petrus is passionate about the ocean and wildlife, making him a valuable asset to NAMCOB’s coastal conservation efforts.

Seabird Ranger

Karin Moses

Namibian Foundation for the Conservation of Seabirds (NAMCOB)
Karin Moses holds a BSc in Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences and has pursued postgraduate studies in Integrated Environmental Management. With two years of experience at NAMCOB, she plays an active role in seabird conservation, coastal ecosystem management, and marine monitoring. Karin’s strengths include fisheries science, environmental data collection, and community engagement. She has been selected to represent NAMCOB’s work at the upcoming Oil & Gas Conference in October 2025, reflecting her growing leadership in marine conservation.

Southern African Foundation for the Conservation of Coastal Birds (SANCCOB)

Funding Partner

Association of Zoos and Aquariums

The Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) is a global accrediting body whose Saving Animals From Extinction (SAFE) programme brings together more than 50 accredited zoos and aquariums in a coordinated effort to protect species at risk of extinction. Through SAFE, member institutions pool expertise, funding, and resources to support both ex-situ breeding programmes and in-situ field conservation.

The African Penguin SAFE Project is one of AZA’s flagship initiatives, addressing the species’ rapid decline through a combination of artificial nest deployment, disaster response training for oil spills and disease outbreaks, and fisheries-related research using PIT tag tracking. With Namibia now home to an increasingly significant share of the global African Penguin population, AZA’s support extends directly to on-the-ground conservation efforts here, including funding and technical backing for ranger programmes that monitor and protect breeding colonies across NIMPA’s islands.

AZA’s support also strengthens NAMCOB’s ability to engage with the global conservation community — including participation in the 12th International Penguin Conference, held on Phillip Island, Australia, from 31 August to 4 September 2026, where researchers and conservationists from around the world gathered to share the latest science and strategies for safeguarding penguin species worldwide.

Founding Member

Namibian Chamber of Environment (NCE)

The Namibian Chamber of Environment (NCE) is a membership-based umbrella organisation that provides a unified voice for Namibia’s environmental sector. Established as a voluntary association under Namibian Common Law, the NCE brings together environmental practitioners and organisations to lobby government and other stakeholders, raise funds, and represent the sector’s collective interests.

Many environmental specialists in Namibia work in remote areas with limited institutional support, and the NCE exists to fill that gap — acting as a financial and resource centre for its members while remaining independent of industry influence. It raises and disburses funds for priority conservation outcomes, and actively supports the development and entry of young Namibians into the environmental sector, including through its youth branch, the Namibian Youth Chamber of Environment (NYCE).

Beyond funding and advocacy, the NCE hosts Namibia’s Environmental Information Services (EIS), a comprehensive online e-library of environmental reports, data, and citizen science tools, and publishes the Namibian Journal of Environment, a free, open-access scientific journal. It also produces the Conservation Namibia platform, sharing the country’s conservation stories through articles, blogs, and video.

As an IUCN member, the NCE connects Namibia’s environmental organisations — including NAMCOB — to broader networks and resources, strengthening the sector’s capacity to protect the country’s natural heritage.

Debmarine-Namdeb Foundation

Namibia Nature Foundation (NNF)

Founding Member

African Penguin Project (Jessica Kemper)

The African Penguin Project is a Namibia-based conservation initiative rooted in Lüderitz, combining hands-on seabird rehabilitation with long-term research into the region’s threatened seabird populations. For many years, the project ran a small rehabilitation facility caring for injured and stranded African Penguins along the southern Namibian coast, work voluntarily managed by Dr Jessica Kemper. Its research arm has also tracked seabirds across the Namibian Islands’ Marine Protected Area (NIMPA), building critical data on movement patterns and colony usage that continues to inform conservation decisions today.

The African Penguin Project was one of the founding partners behind the establishment of NAMCOB, joining forces with organisations including Maryland Zoo, SANCCOB, the Debmarine-Namdeb Foundation, the Namibian Chamber of Environment, and the Namibia Nature Foundation to create a dedicated seabird conservation body for Namibia. That founding relationship continues today through Dr Kemper’s role on NAMCOB’s Executive Committee, ensuring the project’s decades of field experience, local knowledge, and research expertise remain embedded in NAMCOB’s ongoing conservation work across breeding colonies in NIMPA.

Founding Member

Maryland Zoo

The Maryland Zoo in Baltimore has been a global leader in African Penguin conservation for more than 50 years, and is home to the largest colony of African Penguins in North America. Since establishing its colony in 1967, the Zoo has bred over 1,000 chicks, reaching this milestone first among all zoos and aquariums in North America — an achievement recognised with the Association of Zoos and Aquariums’ (AZA) Edward H. Bean Award for its long-term propagation programme.

Beyond breeding, Maryland Zoo has played a central role in wild African Penguin conservation. It has held a 30-year leadership role in avian malaria research, and its Bird Curator, Jen Kottyan, serves as Program Leader for the AZA’s African Penguin Species Survival Plan (SSP), overseeing coordinated breeding and population management across accredited zoos in North America. The Zoo has also directly supported field conservation in South Africa and Namibia, including its “Invest in the Nest” campaign, which funded artificial nests for wild colonies, and contributions to PIT-tagging efforts under the AZA’s SAFE: Saving Animals From Extinction programme.

With African Penguins now classified as critically endangered and facing possible extinction in the wild within a decade, the Maryland Zoo continues to combine breeding expertise, research, and direct support for in-situ conservation — work that underpins its partnership with organisations such as NAMCOB in protecting the species across its native range.