From hope to action: World Rewilding Day 2024

February 20, 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.

 

Vulture GPS and carcasses monitoring among the field activities organised by Rewilding Apennines and taking place on October 2023 in the Central Apennines in presence of vulture officer, Nicolò Borgianni. Massa d'Albe, Abruzzo, Italy
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, we 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 carryied out in Rewilding Europe’s growing portfolio of rewilding landscapes.

 

Cleaning of the channels between Danube river and Katlabuh lake
Cleaning of the channels between Danube river and Katlabuh lake to restore the waterflow.
Andrey Nekrasov / Rewilding Europe

 

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. As part of the Rewilding Europe network, a partner of the Global Rewilding Alliance, we also celebrate World Rewilding Day, together with 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.”

 

Rewilding inspires people of all backgrounds and ages. Everyone can help translate the hope rewilding offers into practical action and meaningful impact.
Maxim Yakovlev / Rewilding Europe

 

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. In Ukraine and Romania, educational events and nature excursions are planned for World Rewilding Day. 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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