World Wide Fund for Nature

The World Wildlife Fund (abbreviation: World Wildlife Fund) WWF; Now officially called the World Wide Fund for Nature, only in the United States and Canada the old name is retained) is a Swiss multinational public organization working in the fields of conservation, research and restoration of the environment. It is the world's largest independent conservation organization with more than 5 million supporters worldwide, operating in more than 100 countries, supporting approximately 1,300 conservation projects worldwide.

The mission of the World Wildlife Fund is to prevent the increasing degradation of the planet's natural environment and to achieve harmony between man and nature. The main goal is to preserve the Earth's biological diversity.

History

Nature Conservation Fund
The immediate predecessor of the World Wildlife Fund was The Conservation Foundation, established in New York City in 1947 by Henry Fairfield Osborn. The "Nature Conservation Fund" was created to support capitalist-oriented environmental practices. The foundation's advisory board included several leading scientists, including Charles Elton, G. Evelyn Hutchinson, Aldo Leopold, Karl Sauer, and Paul Sears. Much of the scientific work cited in Rachel Carson's book Silent Spring has been supported by the Nature Conservation Foundation, including research by John L. George, Roger Hale, Robert Rudd, and George M. Woodwell.

In 1963, the Nature Conservation Foundation held a conference and published a keynote by Noel Eichhorn warning of anthropogenic causes global warming. This report was based on research by Frank Fraser Darling, Vice President of the Foundation, as well as Edward Smith Deevey, Erik Eriksson, Charles David Keeling, and Gilbert Plass), Lionel Walford, and William A. Garnett.

Walrus Manifesto
The idea of creating a fund to help endangered animals was originally proposed by Victor Stolan to Julian Huxley in response to his articles published in the British newspaper The Observer. Huxley introduced Stolan to Max Nicholson, a man who had worked for thirty years to bridge the gap between progressive intellectuals and big business at the think tank Political and Economic Planning. It was Nicholson who came up with the name of the organization, the World Wildlife Fund, and this fund was created on April 29, 1961.

On September 11 of the same year, the first WWF office was opened in the Swiss city of Morges. The World Wide Fund for Nature was conceived as a source of funding for existing and existing conservation groups, such as the International Union for Conservation of Nature and the aforementioned Nature Conservation Fund. Godfrey Anderson Rockefeller played an important role in the creation of the WWF; He recruited the foundation's first employees.

The establishment of the World Wildlife Fund was marked by the signing of the Morges Manifesto, a seminal document that established the ideology and basic principles of the foundation's work.

From the "Morges Manifesto":

What is needed more than any money is to fulfill our mission to protect endangered species: by buying land where natural resources are threatened; by hiring conservation guards... through education and training... By dispatching specialists to threatened areas and training them... We need to do everything possible before it's too late.

Recent history

Subsequently, the World Wildlife Fund opened offices and carried out activities in many countries of the world. Initially, it was only involved in funding existing non-governmental organizations that specialized in the protection of endangered species, using the best science-based methods. Subsequently, as the Foundation's resources increased, the scope of its activities also included the conservation of biological diversity, the sustainable use of natural resources, the reduction of environmental pollution, and climate change. WWF began not only to finance, but also to independently implement environmental projects and campaigns.

In 1984, it changed its name to the World Wide Fund for Nature, retaining the former abbreviation WWF. The renaming was made in order to be more consistent with the activities of the organization. However, in the United States and Canada, the organization continues to operate under the same name.

In the year of the foundation's 25th anniversary, an anniversary conference was held in the Italian city of Assisi. Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh and international president of the foundation, invited religious leaders from various branches of Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism, Islam and Judaism. They adopted "The Assisi Declarations", which asserted the link between conservation and religion.

In the 1990s, WWF defined its mission as:

To stop the degradation of the natural environment on the planet and ensure a future in which people live in harmony with nature, and to do this:

conserve the world's biodiversity;
ensure the sustainable use of natural resources;
contribute to the reduction of pollution and wasteful consumption.

WWF participants and other research scientists of the world's biodiversity identified 238 ecoregions — the most important terrestrial, freshwater and marine habitats. WWF claims that this global biodiversity analysis was the first of its kind.

In the early 2000s, the work of the World Wide Fund for Nature focused on part of these ecoregions; Activities have been carried out in the areas of forest, freshwater and marine habitat conservation, conservation of endangered species, climate change and the elimination of the most toxic chemicals.

In 1996, the Foundation received basic consultative status with UNESCO.

In October 2022, the foundation published a joint report with the Zoological Society of London, The Living Planet, according to which the wildlife population has declined by 69% since 1970. According to the organizations, from 1970 to 2014, the population decline was 60%, and from 1970 to 2016 it was already 68%. Scientists attribute the decline in the population to deforestation, growing consumption and environmental pollution.

Symbolism

The symbol of the World Wildlife Fund is the giant panda.

During the stay of the panda Chi-Chi at the London Zoo, in 1961, she was seen by one of the founders of the World Wildlife Fund, scientist and animal artist Sir Peter Scott. He made a stylized portrait of a panda and decided that the image of this good-natured, protective animal would be the perfect symbol of the new foundation.

The panda is one of the rare animals listed in the International Red Book.

Controversy over initials
In 2000, the World Wildlife Fund sued the World Wrestling Federation (WWF, now WWE) for unfair trade practices. Both sides have used the initials "WWF" since 1979. The Nature Conservancy claimed that the wrestling company had violated a 1994 agreement on the international use of WWF initials. On 10 August 2001, a UK court ruled in favour of the World Wildlife Fund. The World Wrestling Federation filed an appeal in October 2001, but later withdrew its appeal. On May 5, 2002, the World Wrestling Federation changed its web address from WWF.com to WWE.com and replaced all references to "WWF" on the existing website to "WWE", officially announcing the name change to "World Wrestling Entertainment" a day later with the marketing campaign "Get the 'F' Out". Soon after, the company's stock ticker also changed from WWF to WWE. The wrestling organization's rejection of the initial "WWF" did not put an end to the legal conflict between the two organizations. Later, in 2002, the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) filed a lawsuit seeking $360 million in damages, but was unsuccessful. A subsequent application by the World Wildlife Fund was rejected by the British Court of Appeal on 28 June 2007. In 2003, World Wrestling Entertainment won a case that allowed them to continue marketing some pre-existing products with the old WWF logo. However, WWE was ordered to release new branded merchandise, such as clothing, action figures, video games, and DVDs with the initials "WWE". In addition, the company was ordered by the court to remove auditory and visual references to "WWF" from its video library outside the UK. As of July 2012, the WWF logo is no longer censored in archival records. In addition, WWF initials are no longer censored when spoken or written in plain text on archival footage. In return, WWE is no longer allowed to use WWF's initials or logo in any new, original footage, packaging, or advertising, and any logos for retro-themed programming now use a modification of the original WWF logo without the letter F.

Foundation reports
WWF's "Living Planet" report is published every two years. It is called one of the world's most cited and authoritative sources of information about the environmental situation on the planet. The report is being developed by scientists from the Zoological Society of London and the World Ecological Footprint Network. The report defines the health of the planet by several indicators: the state of animal populations, the use of natural resources by humanity, the use of renewable energy sources and resources, the amount of fresh water consumed in production, and so on. 

The press notes that in the 2010 report, experts observed only about 2,500 species of living organisms, while there are more than 2 million of them on earth. At the same time, it was suggested that the sample was not random, but included mainly those species that are on the verge of extinction.

According to a report by the World Wildlife Fund, from 1970 to 2012, the index reflecting the abundance of various animal species decreased by 58%, and the populations of animals living in fresh water decreased by 81%.