World Wildlife Fund history

In 1970, along with Duke of Edinburgh and a few associates, Prince Bernhard established the WWF's financial endowment The 1001: A Nature Trust to handle the WWF's administration and fundraising.

WWF hires its first scientist, Doctor Thomas E. Lovejoy, as a project administrator, in 1973.

WWF begins awarding the annual $50,000 Getty Prize for outstanding contributions to wildlife conservation in 1974.

WWF in 1975 helps create Corcovado National Park, located on Costa Rica's Osa Peninsula.

In 1976 Prince Bernhard was implicated in a bribery scandal involving the Lockheed Aircraft Corporation.

With critical support from WWF and the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), the IUCN in 1980 publishes the ground-breaking World Conservation Strategy, stating that humanity exists as part of nature and has no future unless nature and natural resources are conserved.

WWF's long-established support of projects in Africa is strengthened by the creation of an Africa program and a formal tie (since discontinued) with the African Wildlife Foundation in 1983.

In a New York Times editorial in 1984, WWF vice president Doctor Thomas E. Lovejoy sets forth the concept of using Third World debt reduction to protect the environment.

WWF in 1985 expands conservation programs in Asia and Africa, showcasing the new Annapurna National Park in Nepal and strengthening projects to protect mountain gorillas in Rwanda.

WWF's wildlife trade arm, TRAFFIC, launches an extensive publicity campaign to combat illegal wildlife trade in 1986.

The WWF’s first successful debt-for-nature swap took place in 1987 in Ecuador.

WWF in 1988 arranges a $3 million debt-for-nature swap in Costa Rica, as well as additional swaps in the Philippines for $2 million and Ecuador for $1 million.

The following year the World Wildlife Fund was founded; the international name was subsequently changed to World Wide Fund for Nature in 1989, although in the United States and Canada it retained the founding name.

WWF convenes the Cooperative Working Group on Bird Trade in 1990, bringing together the pet industry, aviculturalists, zoos, animal welfare organizations & conservationists.

WWF in 1991 helps create the Enterprise for the Americas Initiative, which to date has gene-rated more than $150 million in conservation and development funding from the proceeds of restructured government-to-government debt in seven Latin American countries.

WWF in 1992 begins creating "conservation trust funds" for a number of high-priority conservation areas.

WWF in 1993 helps create the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) to find solutions which promote responsible stewardship of the world's forests.

WWF in 1994 initiates and leads the effort of mainstream environmental groups to secure congressional approval of the North American Free Trade Agreement, the first trade convention to address the environment.

WWF negotiates a debt-for-nature swap in Madagascar worth $3.2 million in 1996.

WWF in 1997 launches the Living Planet Campaign, a new vision for preserving Earth's biodiversity.

In a pledge developed through the WWF-World Bank Alliance, the president of Brazil in 1998 commits to provide legal protection for 10 percent of the Brazilian rain forest, an area greater than all of the national parks in the contiguous United States combined.

WWF in 1999 helps craft and secure support from the fishing industry for a proposal to establish a 186-square-nautical-mile no-fishing zone in the Dry Tortugas within the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.

In 2000, The number of forest acres certified under the principles of the FSC reaches 44 million, including 6.4 million acres in the United States.

Central African nations in 2001 surpass commitments made at the Yaounde Summit.

The Amazon Region Protected Areas (ARPA) program launches in 2002.

WWF secures a $53 million commitment from the United States government in 2003 for the new Congo Basin Forest Partnership.

WWF and the Chinese government in 2004 release the most comprehensive study ever done of pandas in the wild, showing nearly 50 percent more pandas than previously thought.

WWF's Board of Directors in 2005 adopts a 10-year goal: to measurably conserve 15 to 20 of the world's most important ecoregions, and in so doing, transform markets, policies, and institutions in order to reduce threats to these places and the diversity of life on Earth.

WWF in 2006 defeats a proposal for the world's largest oil palm plantation, which threatens to destroy the last remaining intact forests of Borneo.

In 2008, Earth Hour goes global, becoming the world’s largest environmental activism event.

A survey shows that populations in the Virunga Massif grew to 604 individuals, up from 480 individuals in 2010.

Harvard University published a case study on WWF called "Negotiating Toward the Paris Accords: WWF & the Role of Forests in the 2015 Climate Agreement":

In 2017, over 2,500 WWF donors and those from partner organizations raised nearly $750,000 to build 45 miles of a new fence that extends bison habitat in the park to 80,193 acres.

The greater one-horned rhinos in Manas National Park are making a comeback thanks to joint conservation efforts under the Indian Rhino Vision 2020 initiative.