Celebrating World Conservation Day: The Cheeky Panda and WWF

World Conservation Day, celebrated on July 28th each year, is a yearly reminder that we need to protect and preserve our planet's plants, animals, and ecosystems!

Our world faces so many environmental challenges, from deforestation to climate change, it is now more important than ever to protect our planet and all that lives on it. That’s why we partnered with WWF to support global conservation initiatives. WWF has been protecting nature for more than 60 years! They were the first organisation to develop a science-based strategy that focuses on the links between food, climate, and biodiversity loss. WWF strive to:

• Averting dangerous climate change.
• Create a sustainable food system.
• Restore threatened habitats and species.

Over the next 12 months we will be supporting WWF to protect and restore nature, keep our beautiful planet safe for future generations, and create a world where people and nature both thrive! To learn more about our partnership, head to our previous blog linked here!

We are excited to share some of the projects that we will be supporting whilst working with WWF. Today we will share 2 of the 6 projects that our donations could be allocated to (this means you must stay tuned to learn about the others too!).

Amazon Rainforest

In Brazil, in 2021, Amazon deforestation and fire rates were at a 12-year high! WWF’s vision is that by 2030 we will have halted the decline of nature. This is especially important in areas like the Amazon where so many indigenous communities still live and work. These communities are losing their homes not only to forest fires, but to land being taken over by illegal mining groups.

Not only is this devastating for the communities, but the Amazon stores nearly 60billion tonnes of carbon each year and with more and more of the rainforest being destroyed and less carbon absorbed, the aim of preventing global warming becomes harder to reach. WWF are working closely with indigenous communities and have provided drones and education on how to use them. The drones allow the communities to see exactly how much illegal deforestation, invasion and mining is taking place, without getting themselves too close to the danger. Thanks to this, local authorities have been able to make multiple environmental arrests and new strategies have put in place to protect targeted areas, saving communities and the rainforest.

Photo credit, WWF.

Wild Ingleborough

WWF is currently undertaking a big restoration project Yorkshire, Ingleborough. Working in partnership with other NGOs, WWF is aiming to bring back nature at a vast scale, restoring 1150 hectares of land. The project is designed in collaboration with local communities – and their vision is for projects like this to become a model for locally driven nature restoration!

Photo credit, WWF.

Through projects such as this, WWF is hoping to show the world how restoring and conserving nature can help tackle biodiversity loss and climate change whilst supporting local people! This is just the start, WWF are now developing our plans to scale up two further landscapes in the UK to address nature loss and climate challenges, exciting stuff!

These are just two examples of the incredible restoration and conservation work done by WWF. At The Cheeky Panda, our mission is to make our world a better place for future generations, and we do this by reducing the carbon emissions from your everyday household products. By partnering with WWF, we can also contribute to meaningful conservation projects by giving a donation from every promotional pack sold. We are so excited by this partnership, and we can’t wait to share more exciting projects with you soon.