By Marco Lambertini, Director General of WWF International

The past 12 months will, of course, be remembered for COVID-19 and the terrible suffering and disruption it caused to millions of people. But, asks WWF International Director General Marco Lambertini, could 2020 also be seen as the year when humanity finally awoke to the crisis of nature loss?

As we entered 2020, we were calling it “The Super Year for Nature”. But the world’s most important agreement to combat today’s precipitous nature loss didn’t take place as scheduled. Another casualty of the disruption brought about by the pandemic.

But the agreement…

By John Tanzer, WWF Global Ocean Lead

The Economist World Ocean Summit has always billed itself as a forum to focus on ocean health and sustainability. But when I first started attending the summit in 2012, industry heavyweights were largely focused on how to extract more short-term value from the ocean economy. Sustainability was still seen as a side issue — worthy, perhaps, but not essential.

When WWF sounded the alarm in 2015 about the value at risk in the ocean economy — US$2.5 trillion a year — due to destructive practices and climate change, industry and policy types took…

WWF’s Markets Practice Leader, Cris Close, takes stock of the recent Dasgupta Review on the Economics of Biodiversity, and explores why the private sector should call for an ambitious global agreement for nature that restores natural systems and unlocks business opportunities.

Recipe for change

In his recent Review on the Economics of Biodiversity, commissioned by the UK Treasury to inform the international response to nature loss, Professor Sir Partha Dasgupta reminds us of a simple truth: we are part of nature, and embedded within it, not separate from it. Our economies, livelihoods and well-being all depend on this most precious asset. …

By Stuart Orr, WWF Global Freshwater Lead, and Henk Ovink, International Water Envoy of the Government of the Netherlands.

The global response to climate change — as slow and inadequate as it has been — has always been two-pronged. On the one hand, we have sought — and fought — to reduce emissions to mitigate its severity. We have also increasingly recognised that we will have to adapt to its inevitable impacts, building social, economic and environmental resilience in the face of extreme weather and rising seas.

When the impacts of climate change felt like a threat for the future…

By Alexis Morgan, WWF Global Water Stewardship Lead, and Francesco Curto, Global Head of Research, DWS

Over the past year, COVID-19 has fundamentally re-shaped our global economy, social ties and the environment. Most of the world was totally unprepared even though pandemics had been consistently highlighted in the annual World Economic Forum (WEF) Global Risk Reports, including last year’s which ranked infectious diseases as the 9th greatest risk by impact. This underlines how identifying a risk is not enough, what matters is preparation and management.

With the exception of a few countries, we can safely argue that the ‘risk’ has…

As we enter a new decade, we need to make sure it is a ‘decade of action’ for nature and people to bring a nature-positive, carbon neutral and equitable future for all life on the Earth. It is time to re-evaluate our targets, and put nature on the road to recovery, by halting and reversing biodiversity loss by 2030 to achieve a nature-positive world. 2021 has to be the new ‘Super Year for Nature’.

The past year has seen the world disrupted by a global pandemic, record breaking temperatures, and devastating wildfires. …

Mind if I call you Elon? Thanks. Along with the rest of the world, I spotted your tweet and feel your pain. How can we really make a difference? How much money does it take, and where does that money go? How can we measure impact?

Let me help you out. You CAN make a difference. You will need to donate your brain power. And wield your influence. The impact will be tangible, joyful and touch the lives of so many.

Interested? Read on.

The answer is in the water. Seriously. Have you heard about the world’s water crisis?

• Billions…

By Gavin Edwards, Global Coordinator, New Deal for Nature & People

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of light, it was the season of darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair.”

― Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities

Charles Dickens’ classic 1859 novel A Tale of Two Cities ruminates on oppression and violence in the 18th century, and the…