Przewalski’s horse (Kertagy is the Kazakh name) reintroduction to central Kazakhstan in June 2024. Photo credit: Jan Mengr, Altyn Dala Conservation Initiative.
As we draw near to the end of this wild year, we are taking you on a journey around the world to celebrate the remarkable strides made in rewilding. From African Wild Dogs to European Wildcats, Pangolins to Eastern Quolls, countless species have been reintroduced, their home landscapes restored, and entire ecosystems are now thriving across all continents! Rewilders are having a global impact; planting seeds of hope through a wide range of positive actions.
Nature recovery is gaining recognition on the global stage – featuring in documentaries, advancing scientific studies, influencing policy, and securing crucial funding – it is truly transforming ‘Hope into Action’. The collective momentum is undeniable.
Following another warm meeting of the Global Rewilding Communicators Network, we look ahead to 2025 and we’re thrilled to launch our theme: “Rewilding Together.” Keep on reading to dive into this wild year together.
Rewilding Successes Around the World
Across all of our beautiful world’s continents, the rewilding movement demonstrated significant strides in 2024. Here is just a small sample of the rewilding successes from Oceania to the Middle East to South America that have happened this year:
Starting in Oceania, at the start of the year, WWF-Australia’s rewilding team reintroduced 19 eastern quolls from Tasmania to mainland Australia at the Booderee Botanic Gardens within Jervis Bay National Park, marking a major step for this unique and endangered marsupial.
The Jane Goodall Institute Australia (JGIA) launched a Resource Box for Schools designed to inspire environmental stewardship among students. This program offers four hardcover books, free of charge, to the first 4,000 schools that register annually. Go and explore the content – it has plenty of rewilding in there, and even better, the team are up for the resources being picked up and used by others!
Rainbow Lorikeet. Photo credit: Sandid from pixabay
Moving to Asia, the Wildlife Conservation Trust (WCT) in India celebrated a successful Pangolin reintroduction, as camera trap footage shows the tenth rehabilitated female pangolin now happily living in the wild in Pench Tiger Reserve, India, and the fifth female to have been seen with a pup. These early successes give confidence for future rescues and reintroductions.
The Pakistan Environment Trust (PET) supported a female-led research project to conserve the endangered Indian wolf in Pakistan. The project, titled “Conserving the endangered Indian wolf in Pakistan using genetic tools” was successfully funded through a crowdfunding campaign, exceeding its $6,260 goal – Thank You to everyone who contributed!
The Altyn Dala Conservation Initiative in Kazakhstan blew us away this year as they won the Earthshot Prize. It is well deserved recognition for 20 years of careful, persistent, collaborative effort that has seen the Saiga Antelope recover from near extinction to over 2.8 million animals – one of the most significant recoveries of a mammal population ever. And they’re just getting started in their rewilding area the size of Turkey!
Continuing the journey to the Middle East, pioneering rewilders in Iraq, Leopards Beyond Borders (LBB), held a range of training seminars for forest police rangers and local community workshops to support the protection of leopard habitats and to reduce poaching activities. Just this month, Asiatic Wild Asses return to Saudi Arabia for the first time in a century, and huge strides are being made by the Royal Commission for Alula rewilding initiative (podcast here).
Indian wolf. Photo credit: RajaniKumarV from Getty Images.
Rewilding is also booming across Africa: the Endangered Wildlife Trust welcomed 36 wild-born pups of African Wild Dogs in Hluhluwe-iMfolozi Park in South Africa, first introduced in 2019. MKAAJI MPYA asbl launched the Save the Aquatic Giants Project, focused on protecting hippopotamuses in the Ruzizi Plain in Democratic Republic of Congo. It is one project among many to integrate nature recovery with community well-being.
The Cheetah Conservation Fund held their inaugural Global Cheetah Summit in Ethiopia, bringing together over 130 experts from diverse fields to restore cheetahs to our landscapes. They recently launched a new documentary titled Return of the Cheetah, airing on Discovery Channel Africa.
Peace Parks Foundation forged two groundbreaking co-management agreements, firstly, a historic 20-year partnership to co-manage the 2.6 million-hectare Sioma Ngwezi Management Complex within the Kavango Zambezi (KAZA) landscape in Zambia, the world’s largest transfrontier conservation area. Secondly, a first-of-its-kind Memorandum of Understanding in South Africa to explore co-management for Tembe Elephant Park, a globally significant biodiversity hotspot in KwaZulu-Natal.
African Wild Dog pack. Photo credit: Pedro Ferreira do Amaral from Getty Images.
Moving up to Europe, the continent is undoubtedly wilder after a host of rewilding successes this year. To name but a few: Rewilding Britain highlighted several successes, including the expansion of the Rewilding Network to 1,000 members, the cinematic portrayal of Knepp Estate‘s rewilding journey, as well as revealing a massive 412% increase in jobs at rewilding sites in Scotland showing how nature and people can thrive together. Rewilding also often brings “re-peopling”.
2024 brought plenty of firsts for Rewilding Europe: for the first time, Atlantic Sturgeon were reintroduced in Sweden, a Wildcat was seen in a Greater Côa Valley rewilding site and a herd of 8 European Bison arrived in Portugal for the first time. In the same month, the first results of the Yale/GRA ACC model were released finding that a herd of 170 Bison store massive amounts of CO2 in Romania. Not to mention the Wild Hamsters returned to Ukraine, Eagle Owls to the Danube Delta, Vultures to Bulgaria’s Rhodope Mountains… and much more.
‘Across the pond’ in North America, American Prairie surpassed half a million acres and earlier in the year they joined Fort Belknap Indian Community in their Swift Fox reintroduction program. GPS collar data shows the foxes traveling onto American Prairie lands – and eyewitness reports shared news of at least 16 pups!
American Humane released a documentary titled “Escape from Extinction,” narrated by Meryl Streep, highlighting rewilding as a critical strategy to save species. Innovators are everywhere; for example, the Colossal Foundation launched this year, working to ‘Make Extinction a Thing of the Past’.
Swift Fox cub and mother on the Prairies. Photo credit: Layne vanRhijn from Getty Images.
We end our journey in South America, although we could take multiple trips around the world (there were that many successes this year!). Legendary rewilder Kris Tompkins, co-founder of Tompkins Conservation, inspired us all in her TED talk that announced a vision for a continental-scale approach to ‘reconnect the wild fabric of South America’ through connecting corridors, pushing the boundaries of rewilding. She challenges us all to think and act bigger ‘to be part of the global movement of rewilding the Earth’.
Fundación Rewilding Chile, in collaboration with the Chilean government, signed plans to establish a new national park at Cape Froward, the southernmost point of the South American continent, and celebrated a new historic sighting of the endangered Huemul deer in the very same location set to be protected.
Rewilding Argentina are bringing the spots back to the landscape! This year, the first female Jaguar was set free in El Impenetrable National Park, reigniting hope for the existing (all male) wild population for the first time in 35 years. They pushed boundaries in translocation too, conducting the successful first translocation of a wild Jaguar between national parks in Argentina.
Now let’s dive into marine rewilding; people around the world are restoring, protecting and advocating for healthy, vibrant and resilient marine ecosystems in all of our oceans.
- A long list of wins from the Blue Marine Foundation, who have been key catalysts for the creation of the Blue Belt chain of 4.5 million km2 of marine protected areas around the world – that’s 8 times the size of Spain and Portugal combined.
- Ocean Wise and the Kelp Forest Alliance have released a first-of-its-kind guidebook for kelp forest monitoring.
- The Blue Alliance MPA celebrates as 1.8 million hectares of coral reef receive funding to support the regeneration of reef systems across 115 Marine Protected Areas throughout Indonesia, the Philippines, Tanzania, and Cabo Verde.
- The Island-Ocean Connection Challenge, in collaboration with Island Conservation and Re:wild, announced the addition of eight new island-ocean ecosystems to its global rewilding initiative, aiming to restore 40 ‘Ridge-to-Reef’ ecosystems by 2030.
At the global level, the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration announced seven new World Restoration Flagships this year. Together, they are bringing 40 million hectares under restoration and are creating 500,000 green jobs. The Freshwater Challenge now includes 49 countries & the EU, restoring 300,000 km of rivers and 350 million hectares of wetlands. Generation Restoration Cities unite 24 urban hubs, restoring their spaces for 75 million people. The EU passed the Nature Restoration Law, the world’s first legally binding restoration instrument.
Saiga Antelope. Photo Credit: DNK-KolyaN from Getty Images.
A Year of Growth for the Global Rewilding Alliance
Now, just a few snippets of celebration from our team:
- We are overjoyed to share that this year The Global Rewilding Alliance reached over 200 partners in October and then rapidly accelerated, to 225 by the end of the year!
- Animating the Carbon Cycle – Website Launch! Our new collaborative website, www.animatingcarbon.earth, is an increasingly comprehensive library of resources for anyone working at the intersection of climate, biodiversity action, and policy. Whether you’re a rewilder, scientist, policymaker, educator, or simply passionate about creating a wild world, we invite you to visit and share this site.
- World Rewilding Day saw the launch of the first “Collective Impact Report”. A visual and hope-filled book dedicated to the growing global rewilding movement, it is the first attempt to assess the progress of rewilding around the world.
- Nature restoration: a powerful climate-policy option – 4 webinars focused on China, MENA, Africa and Europe. These latter three webinars in partnership with IFAW & Re:wild, and the Yale School of the Environment present groundbreaking evidence on how wild animals play a key role in global carbon cycles and were aimed at policymakers.
- Our wonderful largely volunteer team (all of whom are incredible) now includes a Countryfile Young Countryside Champion! Ramandeep Nijjar, our full-time intern and BSc Zoology student at the University of Reading, constantly blows us away with her commitment and dedication. She received the Young Countryside Champion Award in the BBC Food and Farming Awards 2024, an initiative she’d taken before joining us.
Rewilding Together: 2025 and Beyond
On World Rewilding Day 2024, organizations worldwide embraced the theme ‘Hope Into Action,’ emphasising rewilding as a practical solution, and celebrated rewilders taking action in all parts of the world to bring nature roaring back!
As we move into 2025, we remain committed to the belief that every effort—whether big or small—adds up. Our next theme, Rewilding Together, emphasises collaboration, inclusivity, and unity, encouraging rewilders to come closer in collaboration, as well as farmers, fishers, urban residents and rural communities to see rewilding as a shared, achievable vision.
Together, we can rewild our land, our oceans, and our lives. Thank you for reading and for being part of our beautiful movement. Let us know your vision for Rewilding Together, and how we can help you.