AARP has announced the 2023 Purpose Prize Award Winners and ECOLIFE Conservation Founder, Bill Toone is 1 of 5 RECIPIENTS!

Click here to read AARP press release about the one of a kind Purpose Prize Award, The Five Winners and what it means for ECOLIFE Conservation!

To have such a prestigious organization value our work and having the exposure to 38 million households across the country is an exceptional and game-changing moment.

ECOLIFE Conservation, the non-profit organization founded by Bill Toone, strives to redefine the term “community-based” conservation. An older definition might include more jobs for guides and guards, often “protecting” a resource from people who have depended on it for generations. ECOLIFE Conservation defines community-based conservation in a way that every member of a community benefits from science-backed conservation practices. ECOLIFE Conservation aids people and the environment through its stove program and growing food with aquaponics, all while providing crucial protection to vulnerable habitats and communities who rely on them.

After decades of work with high-profile conservation programs and organizations, ECOLIFE Conservation’s Founder, Bill Toone, came to realize that many conservation programs were simply putting bandaids on very serious problems. ECOLIFE Conservation was formed to address issues in conservation at their core: habitat loss which is the largest driver of extinctions, and climate change, which threatens the future for all of us. The antiquated approach to conservation–humans vs. nature–no longer applies. When humans are part of the equation, we are part of the solution.

Photo credit: Philip Cheung