Friends of Bonobos

Our goal at Friends of Bonobos is to save and protect bonobos from extinction. We support bonobo conservation in the DR Congo (the only place where bonobos are found) through bonobo rescue, long-term care, sanctuary, release back to the wild and long-term protection of their habitat, the Congo Rainforest.

We work directly with Congolese nonprofit organization Les Amis des Bonobos du Congo (ABC, Friends of Bonobos in Congo). ABC has played a pioneering role in the rehabilitation and reintroduction of bonobos. ABC works with local Congolese officials and community members to rescue baby bonobos orphaned by the bushmeat trade and rehabilitate them at Lola ya Bonobo, the world's only bonobo sanctuary with the ultimate goal of releasing them into Ekolo ya Bonobo, a protected rainforest habitat. ABC is on the front line in the battle to protect bonobos in the only country they are found – The Democratic Republic of Congo.

Our approach focuses not only on bonobo conservation but also education and community development. We focus on four main areas.

Rescue and Care
We support the rescue and care of orphaned bonobos at the world's only bonobo sanctuary, Lola ya Bonobo. Here, bonobos are nursed back to health and cared for as long as needed, sometimes for the rest of their lives.

Release and Protect
We support the release of bonobos back into the wild at Ekolo ya Bonobo, the world's only bonobo release site. We support the comprehensive protection of released and wild bonobos as well as the long-term conservation of their rainforest home in the DR Congo.

Education and Awareness:
We raise awareness for bonobos and their plight in the US and internationally.​ We also support education and awareness programs in the DR Congo - the only country where bonobos are found in the wild - with a focus on areas where bonobos are most heavily trafficked.

Community Development:
Bonobos are primarily killed for bushmeat. The root cause of the bushmeat trade is extreme poverty.​ We support programs that empower communities living near bonobos to build a better future through conservation instead of the bushmeat trade.

Friends of Bonobos works directly with ABC/Lola ya Bonobo, who for 25 years has been bringing the plight of the bonobos to the forefront of the DR Congo and has become widely known throughout the DRC and internationally as a leading bonobo conservation organization. With a sanctuary and release site in prime bonobo habitat, Lola ya Bonobo is ideally equipped to practice on the ground conservation with directly observable impacts. Over the years, the sanctuary has worked to foster a relationship with the surrounding community as well and regularly partners with local Congolese who are instrumental in the fight to protect bonobos.

For 25 years, ABC has rescued hundreds of bonobos and cared for them at Lola ya Bonobo sanctuary. In 2009 and then again in 2018, ABC achieved the world’s only bonobo releases/reintroductions back into the wild. Our release site, Ekolo ya Bonobo, was expanded in 2019 to 120,000 acres and was declared a protected community forest reserve, saving 120,000 acres of rainforest for the long haul. Now, research is underway to determine the carrying capacity of Ekolo to better inform future release efforts. At Ekolo, we now protect released and (countless) wild bonobos.

Worldwide, the bonobo is still largely unknown, and we at Friends of Bonobos and Lola ya Bonobo are working to change that. We have already done much to raise awareness about bonobos and their endangered status and continue to reach hundreds of thousands of people annually in our outreach and awareness programs.

In the US, we plan to make the bonobo as well known as the elephant or the giraffe. Meanwhile, we will continue to support the release of bonobos back into the wild - in protected and patrolled forest reserve areas. To accomplish this, and to protect more wild bonobos, we will save more rainforest (bonobo habitat) in the DR Congo. We will grow our local awareness programs in the DRC to reach more people, especially in the areas where bonobos are found. As these programs grow in scope and impact, more bonobo orphans are being identified and brought to Lola ya Bonobo sanctuary, so we also plan to grow the sanctuary’s capacities.