Former CEO of Patagonia Gives Presentation About Conservation Efforts in South America

Kris Tompkins, the former longtime CEO of Patagonia clothing company, gave a presentation to the Westminster community on April 10 about her land and wildlife conservation projects in South America, where she has lived for two decades.
 

Following an introduction by her grandson Gardner Imhoff ’13, she talked about founding in 2000 Conservacion Patagonica, a nonprofit organization incorporated in the U.S., to protect Patagonia’s wildlands and ecosystems. The organization is building new national parks in Chile and Argentina’s southernmost region, Patagonia. With her husband, Douglas, Kris had previously helped the Conservation Land Trust create Pumalin Park and Corcovado National Park in southern Chile.

Conservacion Patagonica’s first project was creating Monte Leon National Park, a 165,000-acre coastal wilderness area for the people of Argentina to enjoy and protect in perpetuity. Its next and even more ambitious project has been creation of Patagonia National Park in Chile’s Aysen Region. The heart of the park is the Chacabuco Valley, a biologically critical east-west valley that forms a pass over the Andes and a transition zone between the Patagonian steppe grasslands of Argentine Patagonia and the southern Beech forests further west.
 

Kris began her Westminster presentation by sharing a quote from Charles Darwin about the wonder of the Patagonia region in the early 1830s, which he saw on a voyage aboard the H.M.S. Beagle when it reached South America. She then recounted how the British subsequently brought millions of sheep to feed on the region’s grasslands, permanently damaging them and pushing natural grazers away.
 

The Patagonia National Park will encompass 650,000 acres and the conservation efforts underway include selling off livestock, taking down fences, restoring grasslands, recovering and monitoring wildlife, operating a volunteer program, building trails and opening a park headquarters, information center, museum and campgrounds. Another important part of the park’s development is working with neighboring towns to get residents connected to its creation. “The real challenge is to make a cultural shift from production to conservation,” she explained.
 

She says she feels lucky to be involved with the effort and hopes that 170 years from now there will be restored grasslands, forests, pumas, huemul deer and communities protecting things they love. She encouraged students age 17 or older to consider volunteering in the park for three weeks, pointing out that the work is rigorous. “Protecting these places has been a source of inspiration for decades,” she said.
 

In a question and answer session following her presentation, she discussed the many obstacles needed to be overcome to move forward with the effort and how the grasslands are being restored. “It is a private park now, but in the long view, the park will be donated to the state of Chile and we will leave a huge master plan,” she said.
 

Members of Emily Neilson’s English class and Lindsay O’Brien’s Spanish class stayed after the presentation and asked Kris additional questions about how she got involved in working for Patagonia, what she did as CEO, when she learned to speak Spanish and how she knew what she wanted to do with her life. She spoke of the value of living outside of the U.S. as a youth to gain perspective and how she learned at Patagonia that “you can do anything you set your mind to.” She said that what she likes most about being a conservationist is working with people and wildlife.