The Digit Fund, named after one of her favourite gorillas, was established in 1978 by Dian Fossey. Digit was brutally murdered in 1978 while defending his family from poachers.

Source: http://popcultureaddictlifeguide.blogspot.sg/

Fossey’s initial purpose of establishing this fund was to preserve and protect the world’s last mountain gorillas. This purpose has never been changed, but instead, the fund expanded to address other regional challenges to gorilla protection.

The expansion includes not only the protection of Mountain Gorillas in Virunga National Park, but also Grauer’s (eastern lowland) gorillas in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and also other endangered species in the gorillas’ habitats. In addition to the protection of the animals, the fund also established health and education projects in partnership with various government, non-governmental agencies, and also communities that were sharing the gorillas’ ecosystem. These educational programs help to improve the environment and also educate the people on the importance of conservation and thus leading it amongst themselves.

Source: http://nekropole.info/en/Dian-Fossey

One of the major milestone of the fund was in the donation of ancestral lands by a group of traditional leaders in the late 1990s. With the help from the fund, this act created a network of gorillas reserves which gained government recognition that grants them legal status equal to the national park, while allowing the communities to retain the management role. The Tanya Center for Conservation Biology (TCCB), which offers university-level degrees, was also established with the help from the fund, by the same communities.

One of the recent milestone for the Fossey’s Fund was the opening of the Gorilla Rehabilitation and Conservation Education (GRACE) center in Congo, on forest land donated by the TCCB, in 2010. This was done with the funding from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and design and construction assistance from Disney’s Animal Programs. Four Grauer’s gorillas that had been rescued were flown over to this new facility. Six more arrived in 2011, and others joined them subsequently. The center can accomdate 30 gorillas, and is one of the first in East Africa to have such a facility. The gorillas in rehabilitation can learn to live in a natural setting, until they can be released into the wild.

The Digit Fund was renamed in 1992 as Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International after Fossey’s death in 1987. Up till now, the Dian Fossey Gorilla Fund International is still doing vital work to help save and conserve these endangered gorillas.