Escobar Binyinyi joined the Fossey Fund’s program in the DR Congo in 2004, initially working as a GIS (geographic information systems) and database/management coordinator. In 2011 he became a member of the Fossey Funds Congo field staff, helping to organize the Fund’s first expeditions in the Grauer’s gorilla forests in and near Maiko National Park. Today this area has become the Nkuba Conservation Area, the center of the Fossey Fund’s Grauer’s gorilla conservation work. As database program manager, Binyinyi continued with scientific database management and is also responsible for the remote-camera network that helps the Fossey Fund monitor the forests.

Binyinyi holds a bachelor’s degree in management from the Université Libre des Pays des Grands Lacs in Goma and also studied GIS at the University of Rwanda. Currently he is working on a master’s degree in environment and nature conservation.

Binyinyi is from Rutsuru in North Kivu, near Virunga National Park, where his uncle was a park ranger. This is where he first became interested in wildlife conservation.