Joseph Okori, WWF’s African rhino programme coordinator, discusses the poaching of African rhinos and the illegal trade in rhino horns. Not an isolated issue, it impacts on humans too. In recent years the problem has not only increased in terms of numbers killed, but we see the increasingly organised nature of the crime.
We need political leadership to build a healthy and prosperous future for our oceans and steer Europe’s fishing industry away from the path to bankruptcy.
The lengths that some will go to, for an exclusive Panda Made Me Do It t-shirt….
Whenever anyone sees our rare and coveted ‘Panda Made Me Do It’ t-shirts, they ask us how they can get one. The answer is simple: choosing an action on http://www.wwf.org.uk/doit and committing to “do it” unlocks the exclusive t-shirt that isn’t available anywhere else. Once you’ve taken some positive action for the environment, inspired by WWF’s work, then you can proudly wear the t-shirt as an environmental ‘badge of honour’.
WWF UK’s new animation encourages primary school children to become part of WWF’s Green Ambassador Scheme. The film introduces children to a range of characters — Earth, Brick, Smith, Wheel, Tap, Switch, Puz n’ Zel and Lefty and Righty. Through these characters, children begin to understand how they can take action to make their school greener and have a good time while doing it.
The demand for rhino horn and the involvement of sophisticated criminal networks has seen a dramatic escalation in rhino poaching in southern Africa. Tom Milliken from TRAFFIC talks about ‘The South Africa—Viet Nam Rhino Horn Trade Nexus’, a report into South Africa’s rhino poaching crisis.
In early 2012, a heavily-armed band of foreign poachers, believed to be Sudanese, entered on horseback across Cameroon’s border with Chad. Over two months, the group slaughtered over 300 elephants for their ivory in Bouba N’Djida National Park. Before the incident, the park was home to the most important population of savanna elephants in Central Africa. Very few now remain alive. As international pressure mounted, Cameroon military responded, but it was too late to save the elephants. Since the incident Cameroon has increased protection at its park and announced plans to hire 2,500 new rangers to be deployed across the country.
The threats facing the natural world can be shocking and our impact on the planet is growing every year. But our world is brilliant and solutions exist that can help to protect our living planet.
These short videos offer a glimpse into some of the challenges and solutions highlighted by WWF’s Living Planet Report 2012.
The visuals for the One Planet film were created by researching the NASA and ESA archives for photographs where mankind’s impact was clearly visible from space. These included deforestation and forest fires, water usage, agriculture, smog, coastal pollution and the impacts of climate change on glaciers and polar ice. The images were then ‘nudged’ into human footprint shapes digitally, with care taken not to exaggerate the impacts but to emphasize their human origin.
The images were then layered and animated to give the impression they were being observed through windows of the International Space Station or other orbiting craft. A shallow depth-of-field both focused the viewer’s attention on the details and gave the feeling of miniature photography – lending the sense that this is a small planet, on which we should ‘tread’ lightly.
WWF’s Earth Hour 2012; A human powered dance floor lit up the UK’s flagship Earth Hour event at Somerset House. Inspirational dance act Flawless, stars of Britain’s Got Talent and new film StreetDance 2 performed a twilight routine to launch earth hour. As local landmarks including the National Theatre, Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament went dark, street band the Luminites performed to Earth Hour supporters whilst WWF ambassador Tom Aitkens and his staff served sustainable canapés. Enjoy the film!
How far will you go to help the planet? Watch the video and get involved – it’s time to flick the switch.
