The Maasai Mara is one of the world’s great wildlife landscapes and the stage for the most iconic scenes of the Great Migration. It welcomes around 400,000 international visitors a year, about 50,000 of them from China. Yet for a long time it had no public institution devoted to explaining its natural and cultural heritage.
Initiated by the Habitat Watcher Foundation and built over three years, the Mara Natural History Center (MNHC) opened on 1 September 2026. It gives visitors from around the world, local communities, students, teachers, safari guides, researchers and conservationists a shared place to learn about the Maasai Mara — and to help protect it.
“The Maasai Mara is one of the world’s great natural wonders, yet it had no visitor center where international guests could learn its history, geography, wildlife and Maasai culture before going on safari. That was a great loss.”
To be a window onto the natural and cultural heritage of the Maasai Mara, a platform for public participation in wildlife conservation, and a regional hub linking science, nature education, community development and international cooperation.
From a building site on the savanna to a window on the Mara
- 2004
Simba first comes to the Maasai Mara. After seeing lions on the banks of the Talek River, he decides to stay and protect lions and other wildlife.
- 2012
Settles at Ol Kinyei Conservancy and begins developing a community conservation model.
- 2015
The Habitat Watcher Foundation is founded in California and becomes the main supporter of our conservation projects in Kenya.
- 2023
Simba and Simon Masago begin building the Mara Natural History Center; the Mara Wildlife Conservation Research Group is founded.
- 2026.07
Main construction of the center nears completion.
- 2026.09.01
The center officially opens, and the Mara Wildlife Conservation Research Group moves in.
Founders and advisors
Simon Masago
Maasai chief of the Ol Kinyei community, a renowned bush-survival expert in the Maasai Mara, and co-founder of the Mara Wildlife Conservation Research Group.
Simba Qiang Zhuo 星巴
Wildlife conservation explorer; member of the IUCN World Commission on Protected Areas; visiting researcher at the Institute of Eastern-Himalaya Biodiversity Research, Dali University; expert with the International Alliance of Protected Areas (IAPA) and the International Center for Biodiversity and Primate Conservation; author of Living with Lions in Africa; co-founder of the Habitat Watcher Foundation.
Cao Xiaoling 曹筱玲
Co-founder of the Habitat Watcher Foundation. She spent a month living on the building site, streamlining construction and exhibition management.
Liu Yong 刘勇
Traveller, psychology mentor and children’s education specialist who has brought many young Chinese students to the Mara on study tours.
Dr. Yin Ye 尹烨
CEO of BGI Group. After visiting the site he committed to the project, providing major funding and scientific support for construction and the exhibition, and bringing a genomic perspective to conservation.
Simon Nkoitoi 西蒙·恩夸图瓦
Chief warden of Ol Kinyei Conservancy and founder of the Koiyaki Guiding School.
James Sindiyo 詹姆斯·森迪约
Renowned wildlife behaviour expert and former chief warden of the Maasai Mara National Reserve.
BGI Group
BGI’s design team worked on the exhibition from start to finish, bringing frontier life science such as environmental DNA into the galleries and the idea that understanding genes helps us protect nature.
The Habitat Watcher Foundation is a non-profit founded in California in 2015 to protect and restore wildlife habitat. Its founders are Liu Fu, Cao Xiaoling, Cai Yingcui and Simba.