Environmental
company
Environmental
company
company
We come from different professions, backgrounds, and experiences. What unites us is a shared belief that investing in healthy landscapes is a responsibility for future generations. Together, we are creating a path for private capital to contribute to nature restoration, allowing investment to flow where it can have the greatest impact.
Prokop Svoboda
Eliška Kolomazníková
Founder and Investor
An entrepreneur with a passion for batrachology—the study of amphibians. His professional path, however, took him away from environmental work for many years when he entered the real estate industry and co-founded Svoboda & Williams in 2006. Yet despite—or perhaps because of—the fact that his day-to-day work is far removed from nature, Prokop's interest in the natural world has never faded.
Around 2020, he began supporting Zamenis, an organization dedicated to protecting the critically endangered Aesculapian snake in the Střední Poohří region. Through this work, he became connected with inspiring conservationists whose commitment and perseverance have delivered meaningful results over many years. From there, the path naturally led to the creation of his own project, which, with the help of such dedicated people, would protect and restore natural areas with great potential.
Around 2020, he began supporting Zamenis, an organization dedicated to protecting the critically endangered Aesculapian snake in the Střední Poohří region. Through this work, he became connected with inspiring conservationists whose commitment and perseverance have delivered meaningful results over many years. From there, the path naturally led to the creation of his own project, which, with the help of such dedicated people, would protect and restore natural areas with great potential.
CEO
Eliška was one of the first enthusiasts invited to join the project and has been part of Refugium’s journey from the beginning. She is drawn to projects that serve a broader public purpose, which originally led her into journalism. Over the years, she worked in several television newsrooms, including Czech Television’s science section, where she helped make the natural sciences more accessible to the public through her reporting.
Nature has always been close to her heart. She comes from a family of ecologists, ornithologists, and falconers, making her move to Refugium—at least in a manner of speaking—a return to her roots. At Refugium, Eliška oversees everything from land acquisitions and restoration projects to fundraising and investor relations. She also manages all external communications. Given the chance, however, she is happiest out in the field, exploring project sites and monitoring birds of prey.
Nature has always been close to her heart. She comes from a family of ecologists, ornithologists, and falconers, making her move to Refugium—at least in a manner of speaking—a return to her roots. At Refugium, Eliška oversees everything from land acquisitions and restoration projects to fundraising and investor relations. She also manages all external communications. Given the chance, however, she is happiest out in the field, exploring project sites and monitoring birds of prey.
Tomáš Havlík
Marek Rybár
Ecologist and Field Researcher
Tomáš is a quiet force within the team. He never jumps to conclusions, and when he speaks, you can be sure he has a deep understanding of the subject. At Refugium, he is responsible for the ecological oversight of our sites, monitoring their development season after season and assessing the performance of restoration measures. The reports he prepares form a key part of our restoration projects.
He studied zoology before completing a second master's degree in geology. Combined with his practical experience in hydrogeology, this gives him a unique perspective on the degraded sites we work with, where disrupted water regimes are often at the root of the problem. Within the animal kingdom, Tomáš's expertise lies primarily in birds and several insect groups. He spent five years applying his zoological knowledge at Ekopontis, assessing the environmental impact of various projects.
He studied zoology before completing a second master's degree in geology. Combined with his practical experience in hydrogeology, this gives him a unique perspective on the degraded sites we work with, where disrupted water regimes are often at the root of the problem. Within the animal kingdom, Tomáš's expertise lies primarily in birds and several insect groups. He spent five years applying his zoological knowledge at Ekopontis, assessing the environmental impact of various projects.
Ecologist and Project Manager
Marek is an ecologist with a soft spot for carnivores, especially the larger ones. Having grown up near the High Tatras, he has always known where to go to observe wolves and bears in the wild. He is also an accomplished photographer, a skill that comes in handy when patiently documenting some of the rare animal species in our region.
He studied terrestrial ecology and, after a brief time at the Nature Conservation Agency of the Czech Republic, joined a company focused on regenerative agriculture. At the international company Carboneg, he was responsible for project management and gained not only valuable managerial experience but also a strong understanding of carbon credits and other environmental offset mechanisms.
Thanks to his expertise in GIS software, Marek is also our in-house mapping specialist. The maps and spatial data he produces are an essential part of every project we undertake.
He studied terrestrial ecology and, after a brief time at the Nature Conservation Agency of the Czech Republic, joined a company focused on regenerative agriculture. At the international company Carboneg, he was responsible for project management and gained not only valuable managerial experience but also a strong understanding of carbon credits and other environmental offset mechanisms.
Thanks to his expertise in GIS software, Marek is also our in-house mapping specialist. The maps and spatial data he produces are an essential part of every project we undertake.
We bring in restoration ecologists—experts who can view landscapes through a broad ecological lens. They identify what is not working at a particular site and how it can be repaired. Together with landscape engineers, they then design a restoration project to bring the ecosystem back to health.
External Contributors
- Lukáš LinhartCo-author of the Přední Výtoň Restoration ProjectA trained forester, Lukáš spent many years working for the Šumava National Park Administration in the Water and Wetlands Department, where he contributed to the LIFE for MIRES project. As the name suggests, this large-scale initiative focuses on the restoration of peatlands, wetlands, and natural hydrological processes in the Šumava region, both within the Czech Republic and across the border. The project covers an extraordinary area of more than 2,000 hectares.
Within LIFE for MIRES, Lukáš was primarily responsible for communications and public outreach. At Refugium, however, he has taken on a different role. He is leading the restoration project for a drained peatland near the village of Přední Výtoň, overseeing the process from the initial ecological surveys through to the implementation of restoration works. - Filip LysákLead author of the Maříž and Heřmaničky ProjectsFilip's fascination with ecosystem functioning and landscape restoration began in childhood. As a young boy, he was already "virtually" redesigning the streams around the village where he grew up, imagining how they could function better. He later deepened this interest by studying Environmental Protection and Management at Palacký University Olomouc. Around the turn of the millennium, he began working systematically on his first restoration projects.
Since then, he has contributed to numerous landscape restoration initiatives, including the restoration of fen habitats at the Loučeň Ponds Site of Community Importance, the South Moravian Salt Marshes of Dobré Pole and Novosedly, and peatlands within the Chvojnov Nature Reserve. Most recently, he has added the restoration of wetland sites in Maříž and Heřmaničky to his portfolio of projects under the Refugium banner. - Eva VolfováNetworking and Environmental OversightEva studied Environmental Protection at the Faculty of Science of Charles University in Prague. For many years, she has specialized in landscape assessment and the evaluation of the impacts of development projects and strategic plans on Natura 2000 sites. She was also directly involved in the establishment of the Natura 2000 network, contributing to habitat mapping and the expert designation of protected sites.
Today, Eva serves as Managing Director of PlanTerra. She is also involved in the Acceleration Zones and Landscape Policy projects at the Silva Tarouca Research Institute for Landscape and Ornamental Gardening (VÚKOZ). In addition, she is a member of the Environmental Committee of the Plzeň Region and has served at the national level as Deputy Minister of the Environment from 2022 to 2023.
Eva is a court-appointed expert in nature conservation and an active member of several non-governmental organizations, including Ametyst, the Czech Botanical Society, and the Czech Society for Ornithology. - Pavel PokornýLandscape Consulting and Field SurveysPavel describes himself as a “student of the landscape,” and we can only agree. A natural scientist with a background in forestry and nature conservation from Mendel University in Brno, he is deeply connected to the Bohemian-Moravian Highlands. He has explored and studied virtually every corner of the region and possesses an exceptional knowledge of its springs, headwaters, and peatlands. The restoration of spring habitats and small rivers and streams is one of his particular areas of expertise. He is a co-founder of the River Landscape Association and a member of the Czech Union for Nature Conservation.
Pavel has a deep appreciation not only for landscapes, but also for folk music, poetry, and bringing inspiring people together. In addition to providing expert advice on our sites, he helps Refugium organize the Slavonice Colloquium, a multi-day gathering of natural scientists and conservation practitioners that we have hosted annually in Slavonice since 2022.
Research Partners
Established ecological institutions, non-governmental organizations, environmental centers, independent experts, and dedicated individuals. They help us identify sites for acquisition, study their ecological conditions, and establish the right management approach for the future. This ensures that the care of every site we own is aligned with the best available scientific knowledge and proven conservation practice.
Legal & Financial Consulting
Providing legal and financial expertise, these partners help us turn ambitious restoration projects into viable, long-term investments in nature.
Contact
E-mail
hello@refugium.eu
hello@refugium.eu
Phone
+(420) 605 052 706
+(420) 605 052 706
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