REWILDING THE WORLD –
Our commitment to restoring the natural world is guided by the 12 Rewilding Principles outlined in our Global Charter for Rewilding the Earth.
Developed by leading experts in the global conservation community, including the IUCN Wilderness Specialist Group and other key contributors, these principles were crafted in preparation for the 11th World Wilderness Congress in 2020.
The principles illustrate that rewilding is a dynamic social and ecological movement aimed at benefiting all life on Earth. We invite you to explore these principles and join us in our mission to unleash nature’s healing power.
The Global Charter for Rewilding the Earth is also the founding document for the Global Rewilding Alliance, which was founded at the World Wilderness Congress in 2020. Our mission is to mainstream rewilding in science, policy and practice globally by 2030.
12 Principles of Rewliding
1
The ecosphere is based on relationships
Rewilding our hearts and minds is fundamental. Thus, a crucial first step toward widespread societal embrace of rewilding is to accept, celebrate, and activate the principle of “relationship”, the essential function and ethic that sustains life on Earth.
2
Making hopeful stories come to life
Rewilding is about telling the story of a richer, more vital future but also about executing successful projects—empowering others to support and join this movement by demonstrating positive results.
3
Embracing natural solutions and thinking creatively
Rewilding can help solve environmental, social, and economic problems. Conservationists should design and implement rewilding projects in ways that are ambitious, innovative, proactive, strategic, opportunistic, and entrepreneurial.
4
Protecting the best, rewilding the rest
Conserving the most intact remaining habitats and key biodiversity areas, as well as working to recover lost interactions of nature at all levels and restore habitat connectivity in land- and seascapes at every scale, shows the complementarity of rewilding and traditional approaches to nature protection.
5
Letting nature lead
As in medicine, rewilding efforts should emphasize helping nature’s inherent healing powers gain strength, with the goal that management interventions would decline or cease over time. Humility will allow us to cede control, enabling restored natural processes to shape dynamic land- and seascapes of the future.
6
Working at nature’s scale
Natural systems operate at many scales continuously. Similarly, global rewilding efforts can work place by place, incrementally and at various scales to rebuild wildlife diversity and abundance and allow natural processes, such as disturbance and dispersal, to create resilience in natural and social systems.
7
Taking the long view
To ensure sustained positive effects on biodiversity and quality of ecosystem services (such as carbon storage), rewilding efforts must be planned and implemented with a long-term perspective.
8
Building local economies
Creating, expanding, and restoring natural areas with abundant wildlife can provide new opportunities to create economic vitality and generate livelihoods linked to nature’s vitality.
9
Recalling ecological history and acting in context
Successful rewilding efforts are informed by deep knowledge of the environmental and cultural history of particular places. Working within the social, biological, and physical realities of a territory will foster successful rewilding outcomes.
10
Evidence-based adaptive management
Learning from others, using the best-available evidence, gathering and sharing data, and having the confidence to learn from failure will lead to success and grow the institutional capacity of the rewilding community.
11
Public / private collaboration
In the way that public/private collaboration has helped to expand protected areas, private initiative can catalyze public actions from governments at every scale, from local to national, so that economic and institutional frameworks provide increasing incentives for rewilding.
12
Working together for the good of ourselves and nature
Effective advocates for nature build coalitions and forge partnerships based on respect, trust, and common interest. Connecting different disciplines, working intergenerationally and honoring the perspectives of diverse stakeholders will produce successful rewilding results.
Rewilding is widely regarded as the most natural and cost-effective natural climate solution.
Rewilding simultaneously addresses biodiversity degradation and climate change in an integrated manner.
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