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1. Help Ancient Forests in Mexico

   Posted on 10:00pm Tuesday 14th Aug 2018

   In Central Mexico, the ancient forests of Sierra Gorda are being destroyed.  They are home to the big cat, the hummingbird, And there’s a chance to save some of them. They are full of Pinyon Pines, Junipers, Cedars, Sweetgums, Firs and Oaks – some of them hundreds of years old.  They are home to species such as the Monarch Butterfly and the Big-footed Salamander.  Jaguars, pumas, bobcats, margays, ocelots and jaguarondi live here. But the forest is all disappearing, thanks to human activity - agriculture, cattle ranching and man-made fires. Fire has a particularly bad impact – it can take a forest years to recover from a man-made fire. Enter the World Land Trust. The World Land Trust is working with local, family run Grupo Ecologico Sierra Gorda to conserve habitat in Sierra Gorda.  In the 10 years they’ve been working together, supporters of the World Land Trust have saved over 10,000 acres of these forests already. And there’s more.  Every acre the World Land Trust has protected has remained under the guardianship of its Keepers of the Wild programme, that is, wildlife rangers hired from the local community.  They guard the forests and restore them to their natural state. So how can you help? You can get involved by – I’ll be frank – making a donation.  I’ve made a donation already and it always makes me feel better and that I’ve had an influence on the world’s forests and been able to do something, rather than sit back and do nothing. So imagine spending £25.  And it goes towards saving ancient forests in Mexico.   Isn’t that wild? Where will your £25 go? The thing is, the World Land Trust has the chance to buy and protect an area of 578 acres in Sierra Gorda.   It needs all our support to ensure this forest can be saved for wildlife. You can help and get involved by donating to the World Land Trust’s Ancient Forests Appeal. A £25 donation will enable the Trust’s partner in Sierra Gorda to buy 1,000m² and put it under protection. A £100 donation will protect one acre. This is a very easy way to get involved and do something quickly for wildlife. And to feel as though you’ve made a difference. Donate to the Ancient Forests appeal today

    

    

2. Wildlife Friendly Gardening - help from the RSPB & Barrett Homes

   Posted on 1:00pm Monday 13th Aug 2018

    

   Here’s news of a great partnership. The RSPB have just joined forces with Barrett Homes.   They apparently are looking to create developments and green spaces that’s friendly to nature. Give them a home, and they will come - as the RSPB advert says There's no doubt in my mind that having wildlife in a garden give the place far more colour and life. There's nothing like watching the birds from a corner of the garden take a splash in a bird bath, or feast on the food you've put out for them - or to discover a hedgehog, or watch butterflies flutter from one group of flowers to another.  Honestly, it's like having your own nature show. 60% of the species which have been monitored in the UK in the last 50 years are declining.   And yet, private gardens in the UK cover about 450,000 hectares of land – an area larger than Suffolk. So the potential to create fantastic places for wildlife is huge.  And they don’t need a lot of room, as Butterfly Conservation’s Pot for Pollinators  shows – you just need a pot with a butterfly friendly plant stuck in it and anyone can put that on a patio or balcony.  Anyway, back to the RSPB and Barrett Homes. They’ve created some advice to help you get started giving nature a home in your garden.  The guide has basic steps on how to make your garden wildlife friendly, garden features that will help you make the most of any size garden (so there’ s no need to have a garden the size of Kent to get started), and a full plant guide of what to plant and what not to plant. Get shopping for the birds at the RSPB's online shop So take a look at it – you can DOWNLOAD IT FOR FREE from the RSPB’s website HERE.

3. The Lion's Share Fund takes off with a big roar.....

   Posted on 10:00am Friday 10th Aug 2018

   Let’s ROAR for wildlife! On World Lion Day (the 10th August), it’s great to announce a really exciting piece of news for wildlife conservation. There’s a really fantastic opportunity for business to make a difference and have a real impact on wildlife. Drum roll please for….. The Lion’s Share Fund! You may have heard of The Lion’s Share.  If you haven’t, let me tell you more.   It’s an initiative which is aiming to transform the lives of animals around the world by asking advertisers to contribute a percentage of their media spend to conservation and animal welfare projects. I am really excited by this initiative.  The hope is that $100 million a year will be raised within 3 years.   The money will be invested in a range of animal conservation and animal welfare programmes, to be implemented by the UN and civil society organisations.  The Lion’s Share is working to contribute to the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals, which are aiming to end poverty and project the planet.  Goal 14, Life Underwater and Goal 15, Live on Land, involve supporting animals and helping to conserve their key habitat.  The UNDP (that’s the United Nations Development Programme) will host the fund.   A joint steering committee will take decisions on priority programmes. Money raised will go into creative, game-changing solutions which focus on achieving real impact for the animals and their habitats. Ambitious for sure - but if the top 10 advertisers alone were to participate, this would bring in a staggering $47m each year alone! Partners in the fund will contribute 0.5% of their media spent to the fund for every advert they use which has an animal in it.  And cartoon animals will count as well.  So if your company has an ad with a cartoon animal in it, they can participate! Mars is the first advertising partner.  It will sit on the executive and steering committees of The Lion’s Share and encourage other businesses to get involved. Worldwide advertising network BBDO and leading measurement and data analytics company Nielsen are also involved.  BBDO is contributing the benefit of its experience in advertising, whilst Nielsen will ensure that companies are contributing correctly. The Lion’s Share Fund has a website, and a very helpful FAQ page.  This answers a number of questions which spring to mind – how can we be sure the money goes to where it should, for instance.  (Nielsen will watch that side of things like a hawk.) And 93% of the funds raised will go to the animals that need it.   Rob Galluzzo, founder of FINCH, initiated the idea with Christopher Nelius, a film director.   Galluzzo says that 9 out of 10 of the most popular animals seen in commercials are endangered or threatened and they don’t always get the support they deserve.    FINCH have partnered with Clemenger BBDO to bring this initiative to life. The fund was launched in Cannes  at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, by UNDP Goodwill Ambassador and actor Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, who said quite rightly that it is our responsibility as people to safeguard all life on our planet. Coster-Waldau plays Jamie Lannister in the Games of Thrones. So how can you help? Well, if I see an advert with an animal in it, I'm going to let the advertising company know about the The Lion’s Shares Fund.  It was only launched recently in June 2018, so they may not know of it yet.

    

4. Global Tiger Day is 29 July - and the World Bank is helping to protect tigers

   Posted on 11:00am Sunday 29th Jul 2018

   Did you know that the World Bank is involved in tiger conservation? Who would have thought that all those financiers had a passion for our stripy four pawed friends? Back in 2008, the World Bank joined the Global Environment Facility, the Smithsonian Institution, Save the Tiger Fund and the International Tiger Coalition (which represents over 40 non-government organisations.  And the Global Tiger Initiative was launched.   It’s led by the 13 tiger range countries. In November 2010, leaders of these tiger range countries got together in St Petersburg in Russia.   At this International Tiger Forum, they adopted the St Petersburg Declation on Tiger Conservation.  And they endorced the Global Tiger Recovery Programme. The goal of this programme was to double the number of wild tigers across their area by 2022.  This would take the number of tigers from 3,200 to over 7,000. Tiger Initiative Progress has been made in many tiger range countries: A 2 week hands-on training for over 800 wildlife conservation professionals was launched.  These are from national parks and protected areas in South East Asia.  The idea is that they share best practice which could help all the tiger range countries.  What’s worked to increase the number of tigers?  What hasn’t? In India, population numbers of tigers have gone up just a whisker over 30% from 2010 to 2015 Nepal has done even better, with a 60% increase in tiger numbers between 2009 and 2012. Crucially, livelihoods provided under the World Bank/GEF India Ecodevelopment Project led to a group of poachers giving up the practice in the Periyar Tiger Reserve, Kerala. The Bangladesh Forest Department did a census of Bengal tigers, using the data they got to monitor the size and density of tiger populations in the Bangladesh Sundarbans. 30 Bangladesh forestry department officials undertook a certificate training course on wildlife management at the Wildlife Institute of India. Over 800 forest department officials have had in-country training. 34 subprojects have been implemented on habitat improvement, eco-tourism development and human-wildlife conflict mitigation. So what challenges lie ahead for tigers??  Threats to Habitats and Connectivity will get worse with rapid infrastructure development and the investment in extractive industries Poaching and Wildlife Crime Control, especially to monitor trends. Capacity Building and making sure there are enough resources to boost current efforts and also to develop national centres of excellence. Scientific Monitoring – results must be monitored so that the right interventions can be made. An example is pinpointing poaching corridors around the world. Eliminating the demand for tiger products. . Rebuilding Tiger Populations – it is vital to share current experience and knowledge on how to rebuild tiger populations. You can find out more here from the jaws of the World Bank itself We need our message to reach out across the globe:  tigers are worth much more alive than dead. Actor Harrison Ford

    

5. African Parks reporting from 2017

   Posted on 9:00pm Monday 25th Jun 2018

   African Parks is responsible for the rehabilitation and long term management of national parks and protected areas. They do this in partnership with governments and local communities, and the goal is to make teach park ecologically, socially and financially sustainable in the long term. And at the end of 2017, they were responsible for managing 14 protected areas in 9 countries (it’s now 15).   The areas spanned 40,540 square miles covering 7 of the 11 ecological biomes on the continent.  They have a large counter-poaching force with 1,000 rangers and over 5,000 staff across the parks. They are undertaking various active management interventions: Extreme species translocations and reintroductions Providing security to create safer spaces for humans and wildlife Ensuring that local people benefit Where security has been restored and governance established, they’ve seen the rise of civility and a better way of life has returned.  There is tremendous momentum to make this rehabilitation happen and to continue to build on successes that African Parks has so far achieved.   Founded in 2000, it’s a non-profit conservation organisation. Their Annual Report for 2017 Restoration:  Nature’s Return highlights: The Chinko team achieved success on the ground keeping 10,000km2 free of cattle and giving wildlife a chance to return 39 elephants were collared in one of the largest elephant collaring exercises in Africa, giving them better protection from armed poachers The successful reintroduction of 18 black rhinos from South Africa to the Akagera Park in Rwanda, 10 years after they had locally become extinct.   7 years were spent making the park safe and reducing poaching to an all time low.  Singing children lined the route between Kigali and Akagera to celebrate their return. The park received 37,000 tourists for the year, making it 75% self-sustaining In August, 520 elephants were translocated from the Liwonde National Park and the Majete Wildlife Reserve to the Nkhotakota Wildlife Reserve.  Tourism is on the rise here, and back in Liwonde the human-wildlife conflict has dropped dramatically as a result A long term agreement was signed with the Government of Benin for the Penjari National Park, the largest remaining intact ecosystem in all of West Africa, and a stronghold for the critically endangered West African lion and African elephant In December, African Parks signed a 25 management agreement with the Government of Mozambique to manage the Bazaruto Archipelago National Park, the first marine reserve in its portfolio And HRH Prince Harry joined African Parks as their President. African Parks’ model for its protected area management  Law enforcement for the long term sustainability of the parks Biodiversity conservation, with active management of the wildlife and their habitats Community development – the process of building constituencies for conservation through economic development Tourism and enterprise – well managed parks contribute directly to the local and national economy Management and infrastructure – essential for governance and effective park management African Parks goal is to manage 20 African parks by 2020.    You can be a part of this journey and give your support.    Sign up for African Parks’ newsletter Donate to African Parks