Rakan Zahawi

Dr. Rakan (“Zak”) Zahawi is the Executive Director and CEO of the Charles Darwin Foundation (CDF). With a deep affinity for oceanic archipelagos, he joined CDF in March 2021 after serving as Director of the Lyon Arboretum at the University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa. Previously, he spent a decade leading the Las Cruces Biological Station and Wilson Botanical Garden in Costa Rica—one of the country’s largest and busiest research stations—where he revitalized collections, expanded facilities, increased staffing, and strengthened ties with the local community.

A tropical restoration ecologist, Zak has worked extensively across Latin America, including fieldwork in northwestern Ecuador for his master’s research. His career is dedicated to translating science into action for conservation. He holds a B.S. in Botany from the University of Texas at Austin, and both M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Plant Biology from the University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign. He is also an Associate Researcher at the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Adjunct Faculty at Duke University.