World Wide Fund for Nature

A small but influential group of Europeans-scientists, naturalists, and business and political leaders-rose to the occasion. In September of 1961, they founded World Wildlife Fund. 

Several leaders - Sir Julian Huxley, noted biologist and African wildlife enthusiast;

Sir Peter Scott, a vice president of IUCN; and E. M. Nicholson, director-general of the British Nature Conservancy - arranged the key organizational meeting for the new venture.

There plans were made to establish it as an international fund-raising organization that would work in collaboration with existing conservation groups to bring substantial financial support to the conservation movement on a worldwide scale. The new organization would raise funds through national appeals and, using the best scientific advice available from IUCN and other sources, channel them to appropriate organizations.

Its first call for broad support was the Morges Manifesto, signed in 1961 by 16 of the world's leading conservationists, including Edward Graham, distinguished ecologist and former head of the U.S. Soil Conservation Service. On September 11, 1961, World Wildlife Fund was legally formed and soon set up shop at IUCN's headquarters in Morges, Switzerland. H.R.H. Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands became its first president. H.R.H. Prince Philip, the Duke of Edinburgh, became president of the British National Appeal, the first national organization in the World Wildlife Fund family. 

The second national organization to be formed was World Wildlife Fund, Inc. (WWF)-the U.S. appeal. Incorporated in the District of Columbia on December 1, 1961, WWF named

Dwight D. Eisenhower its President of Honor. Ira N. Gabrielson and Russell E. Train were the first president and vice president, respectively. 

 

Evolution of the WWF Program 

Initially, WWF operated without professional staff. In its first year, the Board approved five projects for a total of $33,500. Early projects included work with the bald eagle, the Hawaiian sea bird, the giant grebe of Guatemala, the Tule goose in Canada, and the red wolf in the southern United States. WWF also financed Ambassador Philip K. Crowe's mission to Central America and Mexico, during which the ambassador met with government officials to build support for conservation. Another project helped Colombian conservationists establish a small nature reserve. These efforts supplemented WWF support for the conservation programs of IUCN, the International Council for Bird Preservation (ICBP), and WWF-International. 

WWF hired its first scientist, Dr. Thomas E. Lovejoy, as project administrator in 1973.

Soon thereafter, Dr. Lovejoy convened an informal conference of scientists and conservationists to discuss the organization's conservation priorities. The conclusions of that distinguished assembly provided long-term guidance that WWF should- 

be largely international (because so many organizations were attending to national problems), 

focus in Latin America and the Caribbean (where at the time there was very little private initiative), give high priority to a strong scientific basis for conservation activities, and 

give highest priority to tropical forests, which contain so much of the world's biological diversity and are so vulnerable to disruption. Learning from experience over the years, WWF broadened the methods used to achieve its objectives.

As some of the first projects indicate, WWF's early emphasis was on protection of individual

species. But it soon became clear that by itself this was not enough: Habitat must be protected for animal life to prosper.

 

WWF in the 80s 

As the World Conservation Strategy began to filter into the strategic thinking of conservationists around the world, WWF gave increasing attention to the professional and institutional resources of the countries where it worked. In the early days, WWF relied on currently recognized scientific experts, usually North Americans or Europeans, to carry out its field projects. This approach provided little opportunity for local conservation expertise and leadership to grow.

WWF found it could have a more far-reaching and long-lasting influence by training local conservationists in needed skills, enabling them to direct their own projects. By doing this, WWF found new partners in conservation-partners who ultimately will be more effective in protecting wildlife and wildlands than any amount of outside assistance. 

As WWF's objectives and methods developed, so did its internal operations. In the middle of 1970, staff were granted authority to approve grants of up to $5,000; this provided flexibility to respond to rapidly changing situations and opportunities to experiment with innovations while keeping the Board agendas from becoming too cluttered. 

When Russell E. Train became WWF's president in 1978, he encouraged programmatic activity by the staff. WWF was now becoming a mix of a grant-making and operating foundation. One of the first results of this growth was the Minimum Critical Size of Ecosystems project (rechristened The Biological Dynamics of Forest Fragments and operated by the Smithsonian Institution) in the Brazilian Amazon. 

There were other programmatic developments. In 1979, WWF brought TRAFFIC USA under its wing, not only to support its work in monitoring international wildlife trade but also to augment the work of each organization by sharing expertise and information about the status of important plant and animal species. A long-range planning process was inaugurated in 1982. In 1983, WWF established its public policy program. In this year, too, WWF's long-established support of projects in Africa was strengthened by the creation of an Africa program and a formal tie (since discontinued) with the African Wildlife Foundation. Further geographic broadening occurred in 1985 when the Asia program was established.

Consolidation with the Conservation Foundation 

In 1985, World Wildlife Fund formally affiliated with The Conservation Foundation (CF). For WWF, the affiliation represented additional broadening of its efforts to preserve biological diversity. To supplement WWF's traditional strengths in fieldwork and the natural sciences, CF brought strengths in policy advocacy and the social sciences. CF also complemented the WWF program because of its experience with such problems as pollution, global needs requiring multinational solutions, and conservation in the United States. 

From 1985 until 1990, WWF and CF remained legally distinct corporations, although with identical boards of directors. The two organizations shared an office, and some staff functions-finance and administration, communications, and development-were combined. Programs were separately administered, however, with each organization issuing its own annual report. 

At its Strategic Planning Retreat in December 1989, the senior staff concluded that a single institution could act far more effectively than two affiliated organizations. Creation of a single institution was recommended to facilitate integrated planning, budgeting, operating, communications, and fund-raising processes. 

In February 1990, the Board of Directors voted unanimously to consolidate the two organizations. The resulting corporation, "World Wildlife Fund and The Conservation Foundation, Inc.," came into existence on July 2, 1990. In October 1991, the Board voted unanimously to change the name of the corporation to "World Wildlife Fund, Inc." The new name became effective on December 4, 1991.