World Wildlife Day

On 20 December 2013, the Sixty-eighth session of the United Nations General Assembly decided to proclaim 3 March as World Wildlife Day to celebrate and raise awareness of the world’s wild fauna and flora.

The date is the day of the adoption of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) in 1973, which plays an important role in ensuring that international trade does not threaten the species’ survival. With 183 Member States, CITES remains one of the world's most powerful tools for biodiversity conservation through the regulation of trade in wild fauna and flora.

Theme for 2023 - Partnerships for Wildlife Conservation

World Wildlife Day 2023 is celebrated under the theme "Partnerships for Wildlife Conservation", honoring the people who are making a difference.

Partnerships operate on a large scale or involve a few children or a school. For some, it could be organizing a school sale to benefit a conservation group, for others it could be posting photographs online to raise awareness of endangered species. All of them are equally valid.

Did you know

• 50,000 Wild Species Meet Needs of Billions Worldwide.
• 1 in 5 people around the world rely on wild species for income and food, while 2.4 billion people depend on wood fuel for cooking.
• It seems surprising, but cacti, seaweeds, giraffes, parrots, and oak trees are groups of species endangered. Currently there are one million species under threat.

CITES

This upcoming year, the UN celebrates a special partnership: the 50th anniversary of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES).

This Convention is an international agreement between governments to ensure that international trade in specimens of wild animals and plants does not threaten the survival of the species. Today, it grants varying degrees of protection to more than 37,000 species of animals and plants.

Through the past 50 years, partnerships have been at the heart of CITES, and WWD will celebrate the bridge that CITES has been for these partnerships to form, making a significant contribution to sustainability, wildlife and biodiversity conservation.

In accordance with this convention, UN agencies, private sector organizations, philanthropies and non-governmental organizations must keep working for conservation, the sustainable use of wildlife and in the fight against illegal trade and the depletion of wildlife.

Sustaining existing partnerships and building new ones is critical for the future of life on earth.

We need to change our relationship with nature and we need to work together.

The incalculable value of wildlife

Billions of people, in developed and developing nations, benefit daily from the use of wild species for food, energy, materials, medicine, recreation, inspiration and many other vital contributions to human well-being. The animals and plants that live in the wild have an intrinsic value and contribute to the ecological, genetic, social, economic, scientific, educational, cultural, recreational and aesthetic aspects of human well-being and to sustainable development.

The accelerating global biodiversity crisis, with a million species of plants and animals facing extinction, threatens these contributions to people.

World Wildlife Day is an opportunity to celebrate the many beautiful and varied forms of wild fauna and flora and to raise awareness of the multitude of benefits that their conservation provides to people. At the same time, the Day reminds us of the urgent need to step up the fight against wildlife crime and human-induced reduction of species, which have wide-ranging economic, environmental and social impacts. Given these various negative effects, Sustainable Development Goal 15 focuses on halting biodiversity loss.

Source : UN