Leonardo DiCaprio is putting fresh money behind endangered species recovery, this time through a new project aimed at 100 of the species closest to extinction.

DiCaprio’s organisation Re:wild and the Bezos Earth Fund have launched the Phoenix Species Project, backed by a $200 million investment. The funding includes $100 million from the Bezos Earth Fund and $100 million from Re:wild, with support from Leonardo DiCaprio, Age of Union, and the Todd Graves Family Foundation.

According to a press release from the Phoenix Species Project, it is the largest single philanthropic initiative dedicated to the recovery of critically endangered species across diverse taxonomic groups, habitats, and countries.

The project aims to help recover 100 key species facing imminent extinction, including mammals, amphibians, reptiles, birds, fish, invertebrates and plants from 30 countries. The press release said the species live across a range of habitats and will require localised attention to recover.

“For decades, scientists, Indigenous Peoples, local communities, and conservation leaders have been on the front lines of protecting nature, and what has been made clear through research, is that species on the brink of extinction are often the ones that anchor some of the world’s most important ecosystems,” DiCaprio, co-founder of Re:wild, said in a statement.

“When we protect those species, we also protect the forests, wetlands, grasslands, and oceans they depend on. The Phoenix Species Project has the potential to drastically shift how we approach conservation and combat the climate crisis at a global scale.”

“By creating the largest philanthropic initiative in history dedicated to the recovery of critically endangered species across continents,” DiCaprio concluded, “… we have an opportunity to make a lasting impact where it’s needed most.”

The press release said more than 100 local and international partners will lead the work through strategic grant funding, tailoring recovery efforts to specific species and habitats. It said recovery strategies may include conservation breeding programs, head starting programs, translocations, disease management, non-native species control and habitat restoration.

The release said the project is designed to provide “the sustained, ambitious investment that endangered and critically endangered species need to rebound,” moving away from small, short-term donations.

It will also track population recovery and threat reduction, and post updates on its website and social media platforms.

One of the targeted species is the golden-crowned sifaka, a critically endangered primate. Association Fanamby, which is receiving a Phoenix Species Project grant, has worked to protect it for years.

“We’ve protected the golden-crowned sifaka for years on a budget that would never match what this species deserves, but letting it go extinct was never an option,” Tiana Andriamanana, executive director of Association Fanamby, said in a statement.

“This funding, this global platform and technical support change what is possible. We are no longer only holding the line against extinction; we can begin to bring the gold of Madagascar’s northern forests back.”

Andriamanana said protecting the species also helps people.

“In doing so, we protect the landscapes that give Malagasy people drinking water, we open real ecotourism opportunities for local communities, and we prove that conservation succeeds only when everyone has a role in it,” she said.

“People and wildlife always thrived together; we only became disconnected, and now it is a homecoming.”

Other species named as part of the initiative include the bowmouth guitarfish, Hickory Nut Gorge green salamander, the Charco Azul pupfish and Australia’s night parrot. The project will support each species through an implementing partner with specialised knowledge, and it will work in collaboration with the IUCN Species Survival Commission.

“One hundred species, thirty countries, and a real commitment to bringing them back. Not managing their decline. Recovering them,” Lauren Sánchez Bezos, vice chair of the Bezos Earth Fund, said in a statement.

“That’s the whole difference. We know how to do this. We just have to stay committed long enough to see it through.”

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