THE PALAEONTOLOGICAL SCIENTIFIC TRUST (PAST)

  
PAST is a South-African based non-profit organization that makes the scientific evidence of our shared African origins valuable to humankind’s future. Now in its 27th year of operation, PAST has become the largest, independent, African-based organisation raising funds to support research, education and public outreach in the African origin sciences, including palaeontology and Stone Age archaeology. These programmes have two goals: a) increasing the leadership role of African scientists in research into the rich fossil heritage of South Africa and the continent, and b) increasing awareness among learners and the general public about the shared origins of humankind and of all living things, and using these facts to build African dignity and to combat discrimination and our decimation of natural environments and biodiversity.

Claude Leon Foundations funding supports PAST’s school and community education programme, the award-winning Walking Tall Educational Theatre Project. Walking Tall workshops feature a physical theatre production about the history of life and humankind followed by discussion of evolution, palaeontology, genetics and the relevance of Africa’s fossil heritage to understanding human diversity and the need to conserve natural environments and biodiversity.