Our Team
Dr. Anne Innis Dagg,
Founder (1933-2024)
Dr. Anne Innis Dagg was a pioneering zoologist, groundbreaking biologist, animal rights activist, feminist, teacher and mother of three. The youngest child of renowned academics Harold Innis and Mary Quayle Innis, Anne earned her BA with Honours in Biology (1955) and her MA in Genetics (1956) at the University of Toronto as well as her PhD in Animal Behaviour (1967) at the University of Waterloo.
Anne received worldwide recognition for her work with giraffes, becoming the first western scientist to study giraffes in the wild in Africa. She is the author of over 60 scientific papers and 24 books including, Pursuing Giraffe: A 1950’s Adventure (2006); 5 Giraffes (2016); and Smitten by Giraffe: My Life as a Citizen Scientist (2016). Anne’s academic interests include giraffes and Africa; gaits of mammals; sexual bias in behavioural biology; feminism (especially in academia); a historical study on Canadian women non-fiction authors; sociobiology; animal behaviours; aggression; and human evolution. In 2018, an award-winning documentary about her life story was created titled: The Woman Who Loves Giraffes .
Her honours include being named one of the top eight women biologists in Canada (1975); received the Pioneer Award from the Association of Giraffe Care Professionals (2010); the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Giraffid Conference (2016); was named the 2018 Canadian Eco-Hero at Planet in Focus (2018) and received the Women of Influence Award from the Zonta Club (2018). Anne was featured in “Courage and Passion: Canadian Women in Natural Sciences” at the Canadian Museum of Nature (2018). In 2019, the Dr. Anne Innis Dagg Scholarship for Summer Research was created at the University of Guelph, she is an Honorary Member of the Canadian Society of Zoologists and an Honorary Lifetime Member of the Canadian Society for Ecology and Evolution, was awarded for her Exceptional Public Service by the Canadian Consulate and was awarded the Laurence J Burpee Medal of Honour from The Royal Canadian Geographic Society. She received an Honorary Doctorate in Science from the University of Waterloo, University of Toronto, McMaster University and Mount Saint Vincent University. She was appointed to the Order of Canada by the Governor General and was honored as a Giraffe Hero by The Giraffe Heroes Project.
Mary Dagg,
CEO and Board Member
Mary Dagg is Anne’s daughter and the Chief Executive Officer of the Anne Innis Dagg Foundation. She is a CPA (Chartered Professional Accountant) and worked as a Senior Director of Finance at a large Bay Street law firm. In 2020, she decided to leave the financial world and has dedicated herself to her mother and her mother’s work. She accompanied Anne on her trip back to Fleur De Lys in South Africa and has been by her side when Anne received the Order of Canada, her honorary doctorate at the University of Waterloo and many screenings and special events for the award-winning documentary based on Anne’s life, The Woman Who Loves Giraffes.
Dr. Fred Bercovitch,
Board Member
Dr. Fred Bercovitch is a comparative wildlife biologist, with an extensive background in zoology and ecology. He has published over 150 academic papers in subjects such as animal behavior, ecology, genetics, physiology, conservation, anatomy, and evolution. He earned his Ph.D. from UCLA (1985), following a two year study of the reproductive behavior of baboons in Kenya. He then became a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Wisconsin Primate Center studying rhesus monkey developmental biology and reproductive neuroendocrinology before becoming a Staff Scientist at the Caribbean Primate Research Center in Puerto Rico. In 2000, he moved to San Diego to begin work as the Director of the Division of Behavioral Biology at the San Diego Zoo. He began studying giraffes in 2002. In 2010, he accepted a position as Professor at Kyoto University in Japan in order to help launch a new program that was designed to recruit graduate students from around the world who wanted to pursue an advanced degree studying wildlife biology, conservation, or primatology. He is currently an Adjunct Professor at the Wildlife Research Institute, Kyoto University, Japan and in the Department of Animal, Wildlife, and Grassland Sciences, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa. In addition to giraffes, baboons, and rhesus monkeys, he has studied elephants in Africa and the zoo, koalas in Australia and the zoo, snow monkeys in Japan, and California condors, Nile lechwe [an African antelope], and cheetahs in the zoo. When not working, Fred thrives on hiking, camping, reading, sports, politics, and the news.
Alison Reid,
Board Member
Alison Reid is the award-winning director of the documentary THE WOMAN WHO LOVES GIRAFFES based on the life of Anne Innis Dagg. The first time she heard about Anne, her story captivated her and never let her go. So began an amazing friendship and their quest to bring attention to Anne’s story and the giraffes plight.
Alison’s company Free Spirit Films produces projects diverse in genre but similar in their exploration of the human spirit. Its debut feature length comedy, THE BABY FORMULA, had a worldwide film festival run, sold internationally, won the Audience Award at the 2009 Inside Out LGBT Film Festival, Best LGBT Film at the 2009 Nashville Film Festival and was nominated for the Golden Zenith Award at the 2009 Montreal World Film Festival.
Her television directing credits include HUDSON & REX, GOOD WITCH, SAVING HOPE, HEARTLAND, and MURDOCH MYSTERIES. Alison is a director alumnus of the Women in the Director’s Chair Program and a producer alumnus of the Canadian Film Centre. She also has an extensive background as a stunt coordinator and stunt performer - which is how she began her career.
Paul Zimic,
Communications and Strategy
Paul Zimic began his work in the movie business at the age of 14 working as an usher in his hometown movie theatre. He graduated university took a job in Toronto as a media buyer for film distributor, Twentieth Century Fox. Over the next 10 years, Paul enriched his passion for movies in the sales and marketing departments of Alliance Independent Films, the Academy of Canadian Cinema & Television, Playback, CBC and Juice Worldwide.
Born with a sense of adventure, Paul formed Grindstone Media, where he distributed many films and co-created and produced TV projects and produced feature films including: THE BABY FORMULA (2008), GRIM SWEEPERS (2010), DOWNTIME WITH BIZNASTY (2011) and the feature documentaries NEVER ENOUGH (2014) and THE WOMAN WHO LOVES GIRAFFES (2018). Getting to know Anne Dagg and helping to tell her story was privileged experience that proved hard to shake. Along with developing a scripted project based on Anne’s life, Paul is dedicated to grow the Anne Dagg Institute and promote the protection of conservation of wildlife and the environment that surrounds them. Paul, his wife Lesley and their three kids live a healthy lifestyle in the fresh air with their dog and cat and maybe chickens, we’ll see. Communications and Strategy
Gregory Edwards, FRSA, MBA,
Board Member
With over twenty years of Foreign Exchange risk management and payment experience, Gregory Edwards is currently a Managing Director and a Global Head leading HSBC’s Transactional FX business based in London. He leads a front-to-back team of dedicated product and origination professionals delivering integrated solutions for cross-currency payment requirements. Greg is also passionate about diversity and inclusion helping drive organizational responses to structural issues faced by traditional underrepresented groups. Outside of work, has been a longtime advocate of giraffe conservation, currently serving as a Trustee of the African Wildlife Foundation focused on the protection of wild lands and conservation iconic African species, and has been awarded the Freedom of the City of London for his charitable work. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society for Arts, Manufactures and Commerce. He is a passionate about travel, wine, baking, gardening and cloud spotting.
Lesley Zimic,
Executive Assistant
Lesley Zimic began her career in publishing in 2000, working for CCMC as the Editor for Campus.ca. Following her time at CCMC, she worked for Owlkids (Chirp, chickadee & OWL magazines and Owlkids Books) for 13 years in production, marketing and directly assisting the Group Publisher. After learning of Anne’s story through her husband, Paul Zimic, and watching THE WOMAN WHO LOVES GIRAFFES, she was moved to help Anne with her vision of creating the Anne Innis Dagg Foundation.
She has always had a love of animals and recognizes the amazing ability they have to affect us in a positive way. Her three kids have inspired her to lessen her family's impact on the environment and she tries to instill the same love of animals and nature in them.