The Gifts are ground-breaking actions pledged by the faiths to combat forest and marine destruction, climate change and a wide range of other environmental issues. WWF International President Emeritus H.R.H Prince Philip will officially accept the Gifts at a ceremony here later today. The eleven faiths taking part include Baha'is, Buddhists, Christians, Hindus, Jains, Jews, Muslims, Shinto, Sikhs, Taoists and Zoroastrians. The gifts range from the restoration of sacred forests in India, to the reinstatement of a Buddhist hunting ban that will help protect Mongolia's endangered snow leopard. The China Taoist Association, the umbrella organisation for all 40 million Taoists in China, is calling on its members to stop using endangered wildlife in traditional medicine products.
Sacred Gifts are catalysts for action.
They are conservation templates for religious followers around the world-a community that has influence over 5 percent of the planet's landmass and is capable of having an incredible impact on efforts to save the natural world. Other Gift pledges include Muslim fishermen helping to save turtle nesting sites in Zanzibar and the Islamic government of Saudi Arabia establishing the country's first ever biosphere reserve. In devising new ways of protecting nature, religious diversity may be the secret to how to live differently and more caringly with nature. All faiths have environmental teachings. What we see in these 26 Sacred Gifts are these teachings becoming real, changing lives and our relationship with nature.