Species

Front page of the Daily Mirror, 9th October 1961. "Shock Issue" brought out after the announcement of the establishment of the World Wildlife Fund (on 26.09.1961). No less then 7 pages were devoted to the wildlife emergency, including the front and back pages and the middle spread.The front page article was alerting the international community to the need to protect the world's Rhinos. Then, there were 100,000 Black rhinoceros in Africa.
© WWF Intl. / WWF-Canon

Over the past four decades, our field work has helped bring black and white rhinos, greater one-horned rhinos, certain populations of African elephants, and mountain gorillas back from the brink of extinction. We are also seeing recovery in many other species in areas where we work, such as tigers in the Russian Far East.

In addition to work on individual species, we also work on a number of significant global threats to species conservation. For example, over-exploitation and illegal harvesting of wild animals and plants for trade is the second-biggest threat to species after habitat destruction. TRAFFIC, a joint program of WWF and IUCN, is working to ensure that this diverse and global trade, which ranges from live animals and ornamental plants to ivory, tiger skins, tuna, mahogany and ginseng, is legal and sustainable, and completely stopped for those species that are too endangered to sustain any trade.

The incidental capture, or bycatch, of marine life in fishing gear is a major threat to many marine species, ranging from fish and sharks to whales, dolphins, seabirds, and marine turtles. In conjunction with WWF’s Marine Program, our Global Bycatch Initiative is working to reduce bycatch through various measures.

We are also looking at innovative strategies to tackle human-wildlife conflict — a growing problem as human populations expand further into natural habitats and people and animals increasingly come into violent conflict over living space and food.

We have achieved important policy wins, such as helping bring about the global moratorium on whaling, controlling trade in endangered species such as tigers and regulating trade in species such as mahogany and sturgeons (caught for caviar).

Armed forestry rangers and their Australian security consultant arrest a poacher with an endangered Hog Badger during a night patrol, Bokor National Park, Cambodia. TRAFFIC Asia.
© Adam Oswell / WWF-Canon

This work is not only giving a more certain future for specific species, but is helping thousands more by contributing to the conservation of all biodiversity within many ecoregions.

Our species conservation efforts are also directly helping people through improved livelihoods, improved food security, increased incomes, improved governance and empowerment. Indeed, our work is delivering towards at least four of the eight Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), thus contributing to poverty reduction in several parts of the world.

Working hard for the future

WWF challenges governments, scientists, industry, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and local communities to embrace both the complexities and the opportunities of species conservation and deliver integrated conservation and development outcomes. This will help save both species and poor communities — and ultimately help us all by providing a sustainable future in which people live in harmony with nature.