A new study says that the tropical forests of Western Equatorial Africa (WEA) – which include significant stands of Intact Forest Landscapes (IFLs) – are increasingly coming under pressure from logging, poaching, and associated disturbances.

The Wildlife Conservation Society applauds the World Customs Organization (WCO) and INTERPOL for its coordinated Operation Thunderball, arresting hundreds of wildlife crime suspects across 109 countries and with more than 1800 seizures of animal and animal parts including big cats, elephant tusks and ivory, rhino horns, birds, reptiles, primates and much more. 

The Government of Bangladesh announced the declaration of the Nijhum Dwip Marine Protected Area (MPA) in the northern Bay of Bengal to safeguard critical spawning grounds for the country’s most valuable fish species and some of the world’s largest populations of endangered dolphins, porpoises, sharks, rays, and marine turtles.

Cutting-edge research carried out by scientists from Wildlife Conservation Society India (WCS-India), in collaboration with the Forest Department, Assam, is paving the way for reliable estimation of Asian elephant populations.

By analyzing records in countries of the Amazon and Orinoco basins—which include Brazil, Venezuela, Colombia, Bolivia, Peru and Ecuador—a paper published today in Oryx—The International Journal of Conservation, categorized 85 past and present initiatives or projects that work to preserve the South American River Turtle, or charapa (Podocnemis expansa), a critically endangered species. These projects are protecting more than 147,000 female turtles across the basin, an unprecedented figure.

Leading conservation organizations, including Global Wildlife Conservation, Panthera, Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), and World Wildlife Fund, alongside The Belize Zoo, Foundation for Wildlife Conservation, Monkey Bay Wildlife Sanctuary and Field School, and the University of Belize and its Environmental Research Institute, have joined together to applaud the government of Belize for declaring new plans to protect the Maya Forest Corridor – a critical link in Central America’s largest forest and a vital wildlife pathway.

Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park, formed between WCS, the government of the Republic of Congo, and the local communities, is arguably the most advanced and demonstrably successful conservation models of its kind in Africa

The Wildlife Conservation Society extends congratulations to conservationist Lee White who was named this week by President Ali Bongo Ondimba as Gabon’s Minister for Forests, Sea, the Environment and Climate Plan.