From hope to action: World Rewilding Day 2024

January 30, 2024

Taking place on March 20 with the theme #HopeIntoAction, this year’s World Rewilding Day will celebrate rewilding and showcase its real-world impact. Let’s rewild now for nature, climate and people.

Black stork, Ciconia nigra, fighting with Grey heron, Ardea cinerea, Pusztaszer, Kiskunságy National Park, Hungary
Rewilding offers hope of a future where people can thrive alongside healthy, resilient nature with an abundance of wildlife.
Staffan Widstrand

 

From inspiration to transformation 

By supporting the recovery of wild nature, and enabling it to function as it should, rewilding can help to fix our climate and boost biodiversity. It can provide recreational and educational opportunities for communities, enhance human health and wellbeing, contribute to the economic revitalisation of rural areas through the creation of new jobs and businesses, and support the preservation of cultural heritage. It is an inspiring, inclusive, and immediate solution that can unite people and organisations of all backgrounds and descriptions and engage them in the process of protecting and restoring the natural world. In short, rewilding offers hope of a future where people can thrive alongside healthy, resilient nature.

 

Volunteers in the Central Apennines rewilding landscape in Italy conduct vulture GPS and carcass monitoring, guided by vulture officer Nicolò Borgianni.
Volunteers in the Central Apennines rewilding landscape in Italy conduct vulture GPS and carcass monitoring, guided by vulture officer Nicolò Borgianni.
Bruno D'Amicis

 

But to help nature help us, we need to act now. For rewilding to have meaningful impactful, it needs to be practised at a far larger scale than it is today – both on land and in the sea. This is why, on March 20, Rewilding Europe will join other rewilding initiatives around the world in celebrating World Rewilding Day, with the theme #HopeIntoAction. This year, we will demonstrate how the hope rewilding offers to both nature and people translates into the need for practical action today – action which can deliver wide-ranging benefits and lasting change now, as evidenced by the work we are carrying out in our growing portfolio of rewilding landscapes.

 

Portrait of herd manager Rafael Vigil Bueno with tauros in the Iberian Highlands.
Herd manager Rafael Vigil Bueno is responsible for the wellbeing of Tauros in the Iberian Highlands rewilding landscape.
Neil Aldridge

 

A global event 

World Rewilding Day was launched in 2021 by the Global Rewilding Alliance (GRA). On March 20, 2024, it will see rewilding initiatives and people from six continents come together again to raise awareness of rewilding and the need for nature recovery around the globe. Rewilding Europe is a proud GRA partner and World Rewilding Day supporter, representing many other rewilding initiatives working to restore our beautiful European continent.

The Global Rewilding Alliance now boasts 167 partners across the world – up from 120 at the start of 2023 – with roughly one new organisation joining every week. These impressive statistics show how the global rewilding movement is gathering pace, as a growing number of rewilding initiatives become established, and established conservation organisations engage in practical rewilding.

 

 

Karl Wagner, Managing Director of the Global Rewilding Alliance, is looking forward to this year’s World Rewilding Day.

“Hope provides us with inspiration and strength, and enables us to change things for the better. The successes of the rewilding movement to date, in Europe and across the world, show that the hopeful narrative of nature recovery is already translating into practical action that benefits climate, people and wildlife. To scale up the positive impact, we just need to go out and rewild more.”

 

Aigas Field Centre guide, Emilie Shuttleworth, leads a small group of guests around Glen Affric, Affric Highlands.
Rewilding inspires people of all backgrounds and ages. Everyone can help translate the hope rewilding offers into practical action and meaningful impact.
James Shooter

 

Act now, join us and celebrate!

It’s time to be inspired, think wilder, and act now to scale up rewilding and the wide-ranging benefits it offers. Whether you’re a big business or backyard gardener, there’s never been a better time to embark on a rewilding journey. From citizens, students and entrepreneurs, to land managers, policymakers and scientists, there’s room for everyone to join the burgeoning rewilding movement and make a positive difference.

 

Isak Edström collecting freshwater pearl mussels Margaritifera margaritifera before restoration work starts
Rewilding Sweden Team member Isak Edström collects freshwater pearl mussels during river restoration work in the Swedish Lapland rewilding landscape.
Arthur de Bruin

 

Do you – as an individual, business or organisation – also have plans to spread the word, take rewilding action, or support nature recovery in some other way? On March 20, organise an event or join existing events that gather together like-minded people and inspire new rewilders. Our World Rewilding Day guidelines offer tips, information and resources for celebrating this special day. And if you feel like submitting your event, we’d love to see how you’re celebrating and helping to turn #HopeIntoAction for a wilder Europe!

 

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