Two orphaned Indian rhino calves meet for the first time in a holding enclosure in Manas National Park, India. Photo credit: Subhamoy Bhattacharjee / © IFAW-WTI.
Partner Organisation: International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW)
Location: Global
We are proud to welcome IFAW as close partners and a Champion to the Global Rewilding Alliance.
A history of partnering with wildlife
Since its founding in 1969, the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW) has been front and centre in protecting endangered animals worldwide. IFAW has built a global reputation as a credible and effective protector of wildlife and they’ve become a key champion for rewilding and partner on our work on re-animating the carbon cycle, so it is a great pleasure to welcome the team to the Global Rewilding Alliance.
In Manas National Park (Assam, India, on the border with Bhutan), where Indian rhinos had completely vanished from the wild, IFAW and its partner organisation the Wildlife Trust of India, have played a pivotal role in reintroducing the species over the last 15 years. Through targeted rescuing of injured or orphaned rhinos, rehabilitation, captive breeding programs and reintroduction, IFAW-WTI has seen the population grow to 54 individuals. Remarkably, the rescued rhinos and their offspring now represent nearly half of Manas’s rhino wild population!
IFAW also operates on Cape Cod, US, a region recognised as a global hotspot for cetacean (dolphin and whale) strandings. With a successful track record of releasing, to date, over 1,000 stranded dolphins back into the ocean, IFAW boosted its capacity by opening a first-of-its-kind dolphin rehabilitation center in August 2023. By reintroducing rehabilitated dolphins back into the wild, IFAW plays a vital role in restoring marine biodiversity in Cape Cod’s waters.
IFAW rescuers bringing a stranded Common dolphin to safety. Credit: Andrea Spence / © IFAW. Conducted under a federal stranding agreement between IFAW & NMFS under the MMPA.
In addition to its work with mammals, IFAW has invested in avian rewilding through its Beijing Raptor Rescue Center, strategically positioned along a major migration route in China. For the past two decades, the center has successfully rescued and rehabilitated over 5,500 raptors from 39 species. The raptors released back into the wild, including these kestrels, are essential to their ecosystems, helping to maintain natural balance as they migrate across regions. Those that are not fit for wild release typically raise offspring that are suitable for wild release.
A released upland buzzard flies away into the wild as BRRC rehabilitators, Lei Zhou and Betty Dai look on. Photo credit: Mengshuang Zhou / © IFAW.
By focusing on rewilding across continents and species, IFAW not only provides individual animals with a second chance but also restores the health of ecosystems and their ability to draw down carbon.
A set of guidelines to maximise climate action by integrating wildlife
IFAW have recently launched a comprehensive set of guidelines to assist governments and policymakers to integrate wildlife conservation into their Nationally Determined Contributions – the commitments they have made under the Paris climate agreement – linking national climate and biodiversity plans.
Wildlife guidelines for NDCs address the critical need to align national climate strategies with biodiversity goals.
In preparation for the Climate COP30, partners and policymakers around the world are encouraging the vital incorporation of wildlife and rewilding into countries’ revised NDCs – IFAW’s developed guidelines provide practical steps as a solution to both the biodiversity and climate crises.
As the Global Rewilding Alliance and partners have shown in recent years in our work on re-animating the carbon cycle, nature is one of our strongest allies in the mission to stabilise the global climate. By supporting nature-based solutions we can supercharge climate action to meet our climate and biodiversity goals whilst also delivering resilience, adaptation and development.
Matthew Collis, IFAW’s Senior Director of Policy, underscored the immediate relevance of these guidelines, stating, “We are offering governments a clear, practical roadmap to harness the power of wildlife conservation for mitigating climate change and strengthening climate resilience and adaptation. These guidelines are not just theoretical—they provide 10 actionable steps that nations can use to integrate wildlife into their NDCs, strengthening both climate action and biodiversity conservation.“
Wild animals and wildlife conservation are important nature-based solutions that can help us to achieve our ambitions, but they are often overlooked in national climate action plans. These guidelines highlight the essential role of wild animals in strengthening ecosystem integrity, and how wildlife conservation can accelerate both climate mitigation and adaptation.
A strong partnership: Champions of the Global Rewilding Movement
IFAW and the Global Rewilding Alliance work closely on amplifying the work of the rewilding movement. Our partnership started over our shared agenda on promoting the ‘wildlife climate heroes’ who are re-animating the carbon cycle – those animal species that play a particularly critical role in enabling recovering ecosystems to draw down vast amounts of carbon. IFAW quickly became key partners on this, particularly in taking the scientific insights to their powerful global network of policy advisors and government ministers.
In three webinars in the run-up to COP16 of the Convention on Biological Diversity, IFAW helped engage government officials from multiple countries, creating the foundation for success at the Cali conference, where the core insight about the role of wild animals in helping to address the climate crisis was specifically mentioned in the official final decision on biodiversity and climate change. Their policy guidance brought additional credibility and practical insight for busy policy officials, creating the conditions where various government Ministers and officials spoke at our side events – and then took the insights into the negotiations, with success!
On the back of all of this great collaboration and success, it is with great delight that we are able to welcome IFAW as one of our stellar group of Global Rewilding Champions – those organisations and high-net-worth individuals who commit to supporting the Global Rewilding Alliance with core funding over three years. Be in touch if you are interested to join this exceptional tribe!
Rhino and Calf. Photo credit: Subhamoy Bhattacharjee / © IFAW-WTI.