As Myanmar transitions to peace after years of internal conflict, WCS President and CEO Cristián Samper, who visited the country earlier this year, writes on the importance of balancing development with natural resource conservation efforts.

Washington, DC – July 30, 2013 – The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) applauded the results of the Fiscal Year 2014 markups held last week by the House and Senate Appropriations Subcommittees on State and Foreign Operations as well as both full Appropriations Committees, which recommended solid support for key biodiversity and anti-poaching conservation programs. The Senate-produced spending bill designates $225 million for the U.S. Agency for International Development Biodiversity Program, ...

WCS’s John Calvelli, Exec. Vice President for Public Affairs, describes the momentum building to save elephants as U.S. lawmakers begin to understand how the poaching crisis is impacting not just wildlife, but security, diplomacy, development, and conservation as well.

Government-NGO Partnership Plays Key Role Trafficker handed down five-year sentence NEW YORK (July 25) — A notorious kingpin in elephant poaching and ivory trafficking in the Republic of Congo (Brazzaville), Ghislain “Pepito” Ngondjo, was sentenced on July 15 to five years in jail by the Congolese Supreme Court, an extraordinary victory in the fight to save Africa’s forest elephants. The conviction was the culmination of years of investigation by the Government ...

Loss of elephants, gorillas and other species threatens long-term persistence of forests Study by the Universities of Stirling, Oxford, Queensland, and WCS warn of imminent ecological collapse caused by unsustainable huntingand other factors NEW YORK (July 22, 2013)—Scientists from the Universities of Stirling, Oxford, Queensland and the Wildlife Conservation Society warn that current hunting trends in Central African forests could result in complete ecological collapse. The authors maintain ...

NEW YORK (Monday, July 15, 2013)— The Wildlife Conservation Society today hosted U.S. State Department Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy, and Environment Robert D. Hormats at WCS’s Central Park Zoo, where the global issue of illegal wildlife trafficking of elephants, tigers, and other endangered species was discussed. At the event, hosted by WCS President and CEO Dr. Cristián Samper and others, Hormats discussed the challenges posed by wildlife trafficking to national and international...

South Sudan’s Ministry of Wildlife Conservation and Tourism and WCS collar elephants with GPS/Satellite units to monitor & protect their populations NEW YORK (July 1, 2013)—With expert assistance from the Wildlife Conservation Society and funding from USAID, South Sudan’s Ministry of Wildlife Conservation and Tourism (MWCT) has ramped up efforts to protect its last elephants by fitting individual animals with GPS collars for remote tracking, a critical practice in the fight against ivory poa...

Bronx, NY – July 1, 2013 – The following statement has been released by Dr. Cristián Samper, President and CEO of the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), in response to the Executive Order issued today by President Obama that will aim to curtail forest elephant poaching in Central Africa and other forms of wildlife trafficking by dedicating $10 million for law enforcement capacity and creating a wildlife trafficking task force at the highest levels of the U.S. government, among other directives...

WCS conservationists, together with officials from South Sudan’s Ministry of Wildlife Conservation and Tourism, have ramped up efforts to protect the country’s last elephants by fitting individual animals with GPS collars for remote tracking.

As a group of armed Séléka rebels invaded the Dzanga-Sangha National Park this spring, WCS conservationist Andrea Turkalo was forced to flee her jungle compound. Her life’s work—and the fate of the park’s famed elephants—now hang in the balance.