African Parks Network

African Parks was established in 2000 as the African Parks Management and Finance Company, a privately held company. Msimang and Hall-Martin, who previously served as director and CEO of South African National Parks, respectively, held director roles at the newly formed company, as did Fentener van Vlissingen. Fearnhead, then head of commercial development for South African National Parks, initially served on the African Parks' advisory board. Planning for the company began after van Vlissingen met with Nelson Mandela in 1998, and early supporters included the U.S. Department of State and World Bank.

The first protected areas to be managed by the company were Majete Wildlife Reserve and Liuwa Plain National Park, starting in 2003. African Parks had planned to manage Zambia's Sioma Ngwezi National Park, but efforts stalled. The holding company was moved from Johannesburg to the Netherlands, and went through some structural changes. Eustace, Fearnhead, Hall-Martin, and Msimang became minority shareholders in African Parks B.V., and continued to serve on the company's board. The African Parks Foundation was created in the Netherlands and became the company's only shareholder. African Parks B.V. was liquidated in 2004.

During this transition, African Parks entered into agreements to manage Ethiopia's Nechisar National Park and Omo National Park in 2004 and 2005, respectively. However, the organization announced plans to terminate these two agreements in December 2007, and stopped managing parks in Ethiopia in 2008. African Parks had also entered into agreements to manage Garamba, as well as two Sudanese marine parks in Dungonab Bay and Sanganeb Atoll. These agreements did not give the organization full long-term control, like most of their other contracts. More internal changes were made to African Parks after Fentener van Vlissingen died in 2006. The organization's headquarters returned in Africa, and African representation returned to the board.

The organization began managing Akagera with the Rwanda Development Board in 2009, Zakouma in 2010, and Chinko in 2014. African Parks entered into a memorandum of understanding with Chad's government in February 2015 to establish Ennedi as a protected area, which became a Natural and Cultural Reserve. Malawi's government entered into agreements for African Parks to start managing Liwonde and Nkhotakota in August 2015. The Wyss Foundation funded African Parks' lion reintroduction project in Akagera in 2015. During 2016–2017, African Parks worked to relocate 500 elephants and other animals from Liwonde and Majete to Nkhotakota. Prince Harry assisted with the translocation, which was done in partnership with the Malawian Department of National Parks and Wildlife, and funded largely by the Nationale Postcode Loterij. Harry served as the organisation's president between 2017 and 2023 and was a member of its board of directors between 2023 and 2026.

In March 2017, African Parks received $65 million from the Wyss Foundation to fund conservation efforts in Malawi's Liwonde National Park and Majete and Nkhotakota Wildlife Reserves, as well as Rwanda's Akagera National Park, and supported the addition of up to five other protected areas to African Parks' management portfolio. African Parks entered into a ten-year agreement in mid-2017 to help manage Benin's Pendjari National Park, then agreed to manage Mozambique's Bazaruto Archipelago National Park in December. In 2018, the organization signed an agreement to manage Ennedi Natural and Cultural Reserve. In 2022, the Republic of South Sudan and African Parks signed a 10-year agreement to manage Bandingilo National Park and Boma National Park and the Great Nile Migration Landscape. In 2024, African Parks celebrated 20 years of operation in Majete Wildlife Reserve.