WWF-India has been working towards environment conservation for the past four decades with projects running across India on every aspect of the environment. The focus on sustainable forests and their management relates strongly to our mission. WWF-India is part of the Global Forest and Trade Network (GFTN), a WWF led partnership, wherein we work towards raising awareness and promoting environmentally responsible production, consumption and trade in forest products, thereby reducing pressures on forest resources. Through our species and landscape program, we work with the Forest Departments of various States across the country to manage and protect the habitat of many endangered species, and conserve critical corridors necessary to connect forest patches. We also engage with local communities to reduce their dependence on forest resources by providing them with alternate means of livelihood. Our work on climate change and forests is also linked. WWF-India engages with the wider public audience and specific stakeholders, for instance, companies engaged in producing, trading or consuming forests goods and services, to raise awareness on forest conservation and create a constituency for change.

India is one of the most bio diverse rich countries in the world. Within India, there are a number of regions that are critical in terms of the sheer biodiversity they harbor as well as the environmentally sensitive areas they are located in. WWF-India is working to conserve these critical regions through a number of initiatives and conservation approaches.

Our conservation efforts are concentrated in 10 landscapes across India, namely, Satpuda Maikal, Terai Arc, Western Ghats-Nilgiris, Sundarbans, North Bank, Kaziranga Karbi-Anglong, Khangchendzonga, Western Arunachal, Himalayan High Altitude Wetlands, and Bharatpur. Each of these landscapes contain a number of protected Areas-Wildlife Sanctuaries, National Parks, Tiger Reserves, and Reserve Forests. Outside this, we also work in Panna Tiger Reserve, Similipal Tiger Reserve, Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve, Buxa Tiger Reserve, and Gir National Park. In these areas, we focus on the conservation of the Royal bengal tiger (Panthera tigris), Asian elephant (Elephas maximus), Asian lion (Panthera leo),

Black-necked crane (Grus nigricollis), Ganes river dolphin (Platanista gangetica), Gharial (Gavialis gangeticus), Great asian one horned rhino (Rhinoceros unicornis), Nilgiri tahr (Hemitragus hylocrius), Red Panda (Ailurus fulgens), Snow leopard (Panthera uncial), and Smooth coated otters (Lutrogale perspicillata). Many other endangered and rare species also benefit from our larger conservation efforts in these landscapes and Protected Areas.

 

We work closely with the Forest Departments of these protected areas to enhance the capacity of the frontline staff by providing training on legal and anti-poaching issues. We also provide infrastructural support to the Forest Departments to strengthen patrolling activities, thereby increasing protection for the forests and wildlife. We also work to conserve and manage critical corridors that are essential to connect forest patches within a landscape. In order to reduce biotic pressures on forests, we work with local communities living in and around forest areas to help reduce their dependance on forest resources by providing alternative means of livelihood and energy.

Every year, more than 30 million acres of natural forest are destroyed to meet the growing global demand for wood and agricultural products. In order to ensure that some of the world's most valuable and threatened forests do not face uncontrolled exploitation due to this growing demand, the Global Forest & Trade Network, a WWF led program, was established. The GFTN links companies, NGOs and entrepreneurs in more than 30 countries across the world with the goal to create a new market for environmentally responsible forest products.

Since 1991, market-driven demands from GFTN participants have increased the economic incentives for responsible forest management. This is helping to ensure that millions of acres of forests are independently and credibly certified, a guarantee that the forests are well managed and that their products come from legal and sustainable timber harvests. The GFTN exists to support and facilitate greater coordination of national and regional efforts to expand responsible and credibly certified forest management, including technical assistance throughout the certification process and enhanced marketing opportunities.GFTN participants