AFRICAN INDABA

2    Tamás Marghescu to Succeed Kai Wollscheid As CIC CEO

CIC Press Release

The International Council for Game and Wildlife Conservation (CIC) is announcing a forthcoming change in the leadership of its Administrative Office in Budapest. Tamás Marghescu, who until recently was running the Pan European Regional Office and the Permanent Representation of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) to the European Union in Brussels, Belgium, will succeed Kai-Uwe Wollscheid, who declared his intention to step down from his post in the coming year, as Director General. 

Kai-Uwe Wollscheid – in the words of CIC President Dieter Schramm – laid the firm foundation for the development of the CIC towards the truly global umbrella organization for sustainable hunting. His outstanding achievement during the last 7 years positioned the CIC as a major player in the field of conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. His extraordinary track record is not only recognized within the CIC itself, but also within the global network of his many, many friends in the conservation and development field. 

At an extraordinary meeting in Vienna on 14th December, the CIC Executive Committee expressed its sincere regret over this announcement and thanked the outgoing Director General for his dedicated and outstanding contributions and achievements for the CIC. The CIC Executive Committee particularly appreciated the firm recommendation of the outgoing Director General for his successor to the post. The CIC Executive Committee, after in depth consideration of this recommendation, unanimously decided to offer the leadership of the CIC Administrative Office in Budapest to Tamás Marghescu. Tamás Marghescu, who at various occasions had represented IUCN at CIC events, is a dual citizen of Germany and Hungary. Born in Paris, he fulfilled his childhood dream by studying forestry sciences in Vienna, Austria and Freiburg, Germany. He joined the Bavarian State Forest Service in Germany and started his international career as Forestry Operations Officer at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in Rome, Italy with responsibilities for India, the Kingdom of Thailand and Papua New Guinea. 

Following a transfer to the FAO Regional Office for Asia and Pacific, he was appointed by the request of the Royal Thai Government as the Chief Technical Adviser of a large rural development project. 

His next career step brought him back to the European continent, where he served as a high-level, German funded government adviser to the Ministry of Environment in Hungary. In 2001, he was appointed as Regional Director for Pan Europe of IUCN, “putting IUCN on the map of Europe”, as the Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Achim Steiner and former Director General of IUCN once honored his achievements. And as the present Director General of IUCN, Madame Julia Marton-Lefevre put it: Tamas ”…was always able to ‘think out of the box’ in developing a vision and making it become reality. As a result of this capacity, our regional presence and programme in Europe has grown tremendously over the past few years.” 

CIC President Dieter Schramm said:”One of my two eyes is crying, for we are losing an extraordinary talented partner in the person of Kai-Uwe Wollscheid, who has earned our deepest respect for his outstanding achievements. My second eye is smiling, because we are fortunate to win Tamás Marghescu along with all his renowned energy and creativity to lead the CIC Administrative Office into the future.” The change will take place in 2010 and in the interim period, Tamás Marghescu will support the work of the Administrative Office as Special Adviser.