Howard Buffett’s philanthropic journey is set to take a new turn as he puts his cheetah conservation reserve in South Africa up for sale, reports the New York Times.

In a profile of Buffett, the newspaper writes, “the making of this accidental philanthropist — the accidental part being his birth as the son of the legendary investor Warren E. Buffett — is an American tale of wealth and conscience passed on to a second generation.”

In 1999, Warren and Susan Buffett gave each of their children $35m (£21m) to donate to the causes of their choice. Howard Buffett, now 54, began a decade of work to build a centre of cheetah research and conservation in Limpopo Province, South Africa. He says the results had been disappointing and has decided to sell the 6,000 acres.

“The reserve was his original philanthropic stake in Africa and his most sizable commitment to animal conservation,” reports the paper.  “Once it is gone, he will complete his evolution from a man galvanised by an enthusiasm for cheetahs, polar bears and mountain gorillas to one consumed by helping the poorest people: African farm families, starving children and victims of conflict.”

While conservation was its original focus, Howard Buffett’s foundation has added ambitious projects related to clean water and increased farm productivity in recent years. It has now bought 9,200 acres of farmland not far from the cheetah reserve. Plant researchers there are now developing drought-tolerant varieties of maize.

However, the newspaper points out that his approach has not yet reached a broad audience, though he is “trying to become a more public person”.

Buffett told the New York Times, “You see people who have been forced from their homes, daughters raped, husbands shot, killed, people who’ve had their arms hacked off with machetes, and you just say, ‘How can you find a more impoverished population?’

“The more I saw that — that just gets to you,” he said. “You can’t just see that and ignore it.”