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WCS Climate Action WCS uses cutting-edge science to understand the impacts of climate change, plan conservation for a rapidly changing world, and devise nature-based solutions to protect people and the environment.

The planet’s intact forests pump out oxygen and hold vast stores of carbon in their biomass.

But WCS science shows that only world’s remaining forests are intact—that is, not significantly disturbed by human activity.

We lost nearly of these forests between 2000 and 2016 alone to road building, mining, logging, settlement, fire, agricultural expansion, and infrastructure development.

In the past year alone, WCS has helped secure, expand, or improve protection for more than million hectares of intact forests in 7 countries.

Securing the Critical Connection in the Maya Forest Corridor Mesoamerica’s five great forests are home to nearly 8 percent of the planet’s biodiversity.

They provide clean water, clean air, and food to million people—and hold nearly half the region’s forest carbon.

The Maya Forest, extending through Belize, northern Guatemala, and southeastern Mexico, is the largest of the five: a biodiverse ecosystem that is critically important to the local Maya peoples.

Advancing Science to Catalyze Action All forests are not equal.

In order to protect those forests with the greatest biodiversity, climate, and social values, we must first be able to identify them.

That is why WCS and partners created the first-ever global metric of forest integrity.

Now the data is available to all—and will help inform targeted action to conserve, manage, and restore intact forests.

Our strategy is to: ■ Advance rigorous science for measuring and valuing intact forests so their value can be recognized and incorporated into national and global commitments.

■ Catalyze global action by securing new policy commitments, funding, and financial mechanisms that incentivize and reward intact forest conservation, working with forest champion countries.

■ Accelerate and scale up protections in the world’s most important intact forest countries—where the carbon value and projected losses are greatest—together with community, Indigenous, and government partners.

Safeguarding Canada’s Boreal Forests One of the largest remaining intact forests in the world, the far northern Canadian boreal region has healthy ecosystems with a full suite of top predators including wolves and grizzly bears.

These forests have an astounding ability to store carbon—nearly twice as much as all of the world’s tropical forests combined—and are also essential to the culture and livelihoods of Indigenous Peoples who have lived in them for millennia.

To counter those pressures, WCS is providing technical support to the land use planning efforts led by the Indigenous Peoples who co-govern and steward the land and resources.

ABOVE Intact forests provide vital climate benefits as well as critical habitat for wildlife, such as this jaguar in the Maya Forest.

Canada’s boreal forests (left) and northern peatlands (below) are some of the richest carbon sinks and strongholds for wildlife on the planet.

WCS is protecting them in partnership with Canada’s government and Indigenous Peoples, for whom these ecosystems hold great cultural and spiritual significance.

As the impacts of climate change degrade ecosystems, disturb economies, and threaten human life at a greater rate than ever before, there is heightened urgency to help animals, habitats, and people adapt and build resilience to these impacts over the long term.

WCS is advancing on-the-ground adaptation projects globally in close partnership with Indigenous Peoples and governments—from ensuring that species have the space and ecosystem integrity they need to thrive, to making forests more resistant to wildfires by helping communities adapt how they earn their livelihoods.

Over the next five years, we seek to further improve forest management in the Congo Nile Divide and deliver additional nature-based benefits to nearly 1.4 million people.

For example, we will work to lower sedimentation levels and improve water quality by helping Rwanda produce cleaner, cheaper hydropower energy.

We estimate that we can help sequester more than of CO2 equivalents by 2050—keeping Rwanda’s national CO2 emissions negative throughout this time period.

Through forest restoration, continued biodiversity monitoring, and ecotourism initiatives, we can secure a resilient future for the Congo Nile Divide’s mountain gorillas and other iconic species.

But the Congo Nile Divide as a whole is extremely vulnerable to climate change, and climate change impacts—amplified by land conversion for agriculture and over-harvesting of fuelwood—have severely degraded its forests.

By building capacity among local communities to improve forest management and restoration within the Congo Nile Divide, WCS aims to create forest corridors that will strengthen climate resilience for Rwanda’s wildlife, people, and national economy.

We are helping more than transition to more climate-resilient and productive livelihood models, which will reduce their exposure to flash floods, landslides, and soil erosion, while increasing crop productivity.

by climate change, traditional methods of wild honey collection have sometimes caused catastrophic forest fires, further degrading the integrity of remaining forests.

North America’s boreal and Arctic regions contain some of the world’s greatest wildlife aggregations and remaining expanses of intact ecosystems.

Humans are also adapting to this warming world, and some of those adaptations—including creating new shipping lanes where sea ice has melted—are increasing impacts on species already having difficulty surviving.

Female walruses and their calves have had to move to land due to the loss of summer sea ice, and by doing so are closer to coastal villages and shipping lanes.

Yet as climate change causes ocean waters globally to heat up and become more acidic, and sea levels to rise, the vast majority of coral reef ecosystems are at risk.

WCS is leading efforts to scale up global monitoring for sensitive corals—and targeting conservation efforts to those reefs with the best chance of surviving climate change.

There is reason to be hopeful: in late discovered an incredible climate refuge within a rare ocean cool spot along East Africa’s KenyaTanzania coast after analyzing data we and our partners collected over three decades.

Despite its modest size, we found that this cool spot is protecting large populations of corals from thermal stress, bleaching, and mortality, and therefore is providing a safe haven for vulnerable marine species.

If well-managed, this region can serve as a sanctuary for threatened biodiversity while providing high yields of foods central to the region’s unique cultural heritage.

We will work to identify similarly resilient environments and reefs across the world’s oceans, and encourage our government and community partners to focus conservation efforts on these safe havens.

Across North America, we seek to leverage our cutting-edge science, longstanding commitments to the places we work, and enduring partnerships with governments as well as First Nations and Indigenous communities to strengthen local stewardship and policy, and ensure these extraordinary ecosystems adapt and survive.

WCS research on corals in the Western Indian Ocean has helped prove the existence of climate refuges that are poised to survive even as water temperatures rise.

WCS’s track record of sustained conservation results also makes us a trusted partner of governments around the world.

PLANNED GIVING You can build a conservation legacy by designating WCS as a beneficiary in your will or trust.

At this level of giving, you receive all the benefits of Conservation Patrons, plus exclusive invitations and insider access to WCS leadership and Program experts.

WCS’s Conservation Patrons are saving wildlife and wild places by giving at the $1,500 to $24,999 level.

Patrons receive special conservation impact updates, invitations to insider events, recognition in the WCS Impact Report, and the option to receive zoo benefits with access to our five NYC wildlife parks.

WCS Corporate Partners provide vital operating support of our conservation efforts through philanthropic giving, corporate membership, sponsorship, and cause marketing.

A copy of this annual report may be obtained by writing to the Chair of the Board, Wildlife Conservation Society, New York 10460.

“I want to earn a Masters degree in Business Administration,” she says.

“I want to work in a rewarding job, preferably in a business environment so I can be part of implementing a diverse, inclusive atmosphere like they have built at Accenture.

The former Covenant House New York resident is working hard toward a bachelor’s degree, followed by a master’s, and then a career as a pilot in the Navy.

I L D L I F E AWI seeks to reduce the detrimental impacts of human activities on wild animals.

environmental impact of its wildlife damage management programs.

AWI is also working to protect beavers by funding and promoting innovations to prevent flooding from beaver dams, assisting Wildlife Services in obtaining nonlethal beaver management training for staff, and proposing a federal grant program to help local governments install water flow control devices—rather than rely on cruel traps—to protect roads from beaver-caused flooding.

In May to BLM officials on the dangerous overreliance on helicopters to remove horses from the range and the negative impacts such operations pose to equine welfare.

For the second year in a row, AWI awarded scholarships of $ high school seniors in the United States who plan to use their post-secondary education to alleviate animal suffering.

The already active in promoting animal welfare in their schools and communities.

Entrants submitted essays, photos, and videos addressing the causes of animal suffering and proposed solutions to these issues.

AWI was pleased to award prizes for efforts to provide compassionate veterinary care to Indian street dogs, protect wildlife from toxic electronic waste, and work with a local animal shelter to engage fellow students in volunteer opportunities.

The national government subsequently began working toward an animal welfare law that would ban import of cetaceans for display, tourist encounters with cetaceans (such as swim-with-dolphin programs), and cetacean displays in any new facilities.

And with support from AWI and other organizations, a joint IWC/Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species virtual workshop was held in April to identify and prioritize the research needed to advance our understanding of cetacean contributions to ecosystem functioning.

A report from the workshop (published just after the close of the fiscal year) emphasizes the ways in which whales help mitigate climate change, transport nutrients, enhance marine productivity, and promote biodiversity in marine ecosystems.

Canada to present on concerns related to right whale entanglement and MSC snow crab certifications.

with producers to formulate disaster preparedness plans that would help avoid mass animal deaths in such situations.

changes to the NFPA code for animal housing that will provide better protections for farm animals.

Among the problems documented by these records is the suffering of millions of birds at slaughter plants due to being crushed and asphyxiated, exposed to extreme weather, and immersed in scalding hot water without being properly rendered unconscious beforehand.

A&M University) for testing materials as environmental enrichment items for birds and other species; Dr.

a project assessing voluntary interaction of carp with novel environmental enrichment items that promote cognitive stimulation and agency.

The transition was smooth and animal care personnel, veterinarians, researchers, and students were able to continue engaging in discussions related to improving the conditions under which animals are housed and cared for in research institutions.

Popcorn enrichment for primates, eliminating boredom in cats, social housing of hamsters, and environmental enrichment for sheep were among the many topics of conversation.

We work to ensure diligent enforcement of these laws and fight efforts to roll back hard-won animal protections.

was signed into law at the end of included an impressive number of animal welfare wins that AWI championed and worked with members of Congress to help bring about.

The bill provides significant funding for + programs to provide shelter to survivors of domestic violence and their companion animals, + conservation efforts on behalf of critically endangered North Atlantic right whales, + efforts to combat wildlife trafficking and dangerous wildlife practices that threaten global public health, and + Horse Protection Act enforcement.

Conversely, the bill includes funding bans that, during the fiscal year, prevent + licensing of Class B dealers (who acquire animals from random sources and seek to sell them to laboratories for experimentation), + operation of horse slaughter facilities within the United States, and + sale to foreign slaughterhouses of wild horses and burros managed by the Bureau of Land Management and the US Forest Service.

January, and a number of animal welfare bills AWI worked on and helped promote were reintroduced within the first six months.

support efforts by local governments and nonprofit organizations to rescue and rehabilitate sick and injured marine mammals and efforts to determine the causes of such injuries and illnesses, and + the Save America’s Forgotten Equines (SAFE) Act (HR ban the slaughter of horses for human consumption, as well as their export for that purpose.

Due to the pandemic, the half-day meeting was held virtually, with from 15 animal protection organizations and approximately 15 USDA staff.

We emphasized the need for the USDA to prevent animal suffering at horse shows, puppy mills, other animal dealers, zoos, circuses, handlers, and research laboratories, as well as during air travel.

We develop resources to help law enforcement officials prosecute animal abusers and help social service agencies address the relationship between animal cruelty and family violence.

Randour serve on the boards and task forces of several partnerships involving law enforcement agencies, other government entities, and nongovernmental organizations working to combat animal cruelty.

Reporting Act, which would require that data collected by the federal government from state child protection agencies include information about animal abuse as a risk factor for child abuse.

widespread disruptions, one of several actions AWI took on behalf of wild and domestic animals was to provide emergency grants to two rescue facilities, housing a combined were facing catastrophic shortages of food, water, and critical supplies.

The AWI Quarterly magazine is distributed to over and organizations, including public libraries, deans of medical and veterinary schools, laboratory technicians, scientists, farmers, teachers, law enforcement officers, shelters, animal protection organizations, members of Congress, and AWI members.

veterinarians reporting animal abuse, and vets in the state may now make good-faith reports of suspected animal abuse to law enforcement in most cases.

All or require vets to report suspected animal cruelty.

After a improve education and communication among vets regarding animal abuse, AWI developed posters for vet offices on abuse warning signs and what to do if abuse is suspected.

While animal dissection remains commonplace in K– have been shown to be more effective, inclusive, and economical.

International transport of farm animals by sea vessel raises serious animal welfare issues.

A rule enacted by the USDA in to a petition filed by AWI requires inspections prior to export to ensure the animals meet the World Organisation for Animal Health’s fitness-to-travel standards.

A United Nations Environment Programme report, Preventing the Next Pandemic: Zoonotic diseases and how to break the chain of transmission, identifies major trends driving the increasing emergence of zoonotic diseases— including increased demand for animal protein, a rise in intense and unsustainable farming, and increased use and exploitation of wildlife.

The report also calls on nations to adopt animal welfare standards for the care, housing, and transport of live animals along the entire supply chain to reduce disease transmission.

Higher-welfare alternatives exist, but deceptive labels on conventionally grown birds make it hard for consumers to analyze animal welfare claims.

CARI’MAM comprises marine mammal stakeholders and experts in the Wider Caribbean and provides countries with a way to share information, combine resources, and cooperate on marine mammal conservation issues.

Exotic and continued the animal abuse, lost his exhibitor’s license and faces a hefty fine or jail.

general with wildlife trafficking, conspiracy, and animal cruelty.

The exact number is unknown, as rodents are not covered under the Animal Welfare Act, the primary federal law for the protection of research animals.

The ability to exercise control over one’s environment is recognized as an important component of good welfare.

The monkeys showed clear preferences for certain sights (earthworms over forest scenes) and sounds (traffic over rain).

A rare winter storm hit Texas in February burst pipelines, and water shortages.