Jack Ma, founder and executive chairman of e-commerce titan Alibaba Group, has reportedly bought a 28,100-acre property in New York's Adirondacks for $23 million for conservation purposes and also for personal retreat, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal.
Once owned by William A. Rockefeller Jr, the estate, known as Brandon Park, has a 1940s log camp with gated entrance and includes more than nine miles of the St.Regis River, as well as streams, ponds, lakes and forests.
Jim Wilkinson, the spokesman for the Chinese billionaire, told the Wall Street Journal that the purchase was principally motivated by the desire to preserve the property, as well as plans by Jack Ma to use the property for his occasional personal retreat.
According to the Wall Street Journal, there are two homes on the property, as well as lean-tos and a horse barn, which Jack Ma bought in May through an entity named New Brandon LLC.
The report said that the Chinese Internet tycoon is planning to form a nonprofit entity that will manage Brandon Park, as the land is a known habitat of the white-tailed deer.
In China, Jack Ma co-chairs the Peach Garden ecological conservation foundation based in Ningbo. The non-profit organization was set up in April, and aims to help in alleviating air and water pollution in the country.
The Alibaba CEO has also made donations to various conservation efforts in China, including efforts to create the Sichuan Nature Conservation Foundation and the Laohegou Nature Reserve in Sichuan.
Ma also created a charitable trust in 2014 that now has an endowment of $3 billion.
"Protecting the environment in China will always be Jack's first and foremost priority, and he will continue his strong efforts here," Wilkinson told The Wall Street Journal.
"This international land purchase reflects Jack's belief that we all inhabit the same planet and we all breathe the same air, so we are dependent on each other for our collective future."