We have been working on NGOs since EMAUS came to school to give us a speech about fair trade and other interesting solidary actions.
The NGO we have chosen is environmentally-friendly and keeps on helping endangered species and avoiding pollution. We hope you will find interesting the information in the next few paragraphs.
The
World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) is an international
non-governmental organization working on issues regarding the
conservation, research and restoration of the environment. It is the
world's largest independent conservation organization with over 5
million supporters worldwide, working in more than 100 countries,
supporting around 1,300 environmental projects.
The
group says its mission is "to avoid the destruction of our
environment". Currently, much of its work focuses on the
conservation of the world's biodiversity: forests, freshwater
ecosystems, oceans and coasts. Among other issues, it is also
concerned with endangered species, pollution and climate change.
WWF
was formed on 29 April 1961, under the name of World Wildlife
Fund, and its first office was opened on 11 September that same
year in Morges, Switzerland. Godfrey A. Rockefeller played an
important role in its creation, assembling the first staff. The
American Conservation Association, was joined into the WWF.
WWF
has set up offices and operations around the world. It originally
worked with grants to non-governmental organizations, based on the
best-available scientific knowledge and with an initial focus on the
protection of endangered species. As they get more money, its
operations expanded into other areas such as the preservation of
biological diversity, sustainable use of natural resources, the
reduction of pollution, and climate change. The organization also
began to run projects, and by the 1980s started to take a more
strategic advantage to its conservation activities.
The
Giant Panda mascot of WWF originated from a panda named Chi Chi
that was moved from the Beijing Zoo to the London Zoo in the same
year of the establishment of WWF. As the only giant panda residing in
the Western area at that time and as it is an endangered specie,
panda has become the symbol of the organization. Moreover, the
organization also needs an animal that could be printed in black and
white, because they also wanted to avoid pollution.
