Rainforest for Sale

Press Release dated: Wednesday, April 09, 2003

The World Land Trust has been instrumental in saving nearly 300,000 acres of tropical rainforests and other habitats since it was founded in 1989. To put this in some sort of perspective, that's more than the RSPB owns after more than a century of existence.

Now this does not mean that the work of the RSPB is not vital, and that they don't put a lot of thought into how they make their land purchases, it's simply a reflection on the fact that land in the UK can be very expensive. Even the National Trust, owns not much more than 500,000 acres, and all the county wildlife trusts together only own about 60,000 acres. With land prices in the UK often over £4000 an acre, and rarely less than £400, this is hardly surprising. But where the World Land Trust is operating, prices are usually under £75 an acre, and can be less than £10 an acre. In fact there are parts of the Amazon where it can be as little as £2 an acre. And of course the range of species can be enormous. A 600 acre nature reserve was recently purchased in Suffolk at a cost of over £1million. The World Land Trust could save over half a million acres of Amazonian rainforests for that amount.

When the World Land Trust was founded in 1989, it was to develop the 'buy an acre of rainforest' for the newly founded Programme for Belize. It was the first of such schemes to get widespread publicity in the UK. Prior to that there had been the purchase of Alice's Meadow in Oxford, and a few other one-offs. But the PfB received a huge amount of publicity and stimulated John Burton, Bruce Coleman, David Pedley and Jerry Bertrand* to create a new charity.

At the time some organisations were not in favour of land purchase, feeling that private acquisition was the wrong strategy and that it should be the responsibility of governments. However, over the past thirteen years, and with the benefit of hindsight, it is clear that acquisition was by far the most effective conservation strategy. It is worth noting that the land purchase in Belize, which resulted directly from WLT's fundraising, is now part of the largest single tract of forest left in the whole of Central America.

The Belize fundraising was successful -- between World Land Trust Massachusetts Audubon Society, and the The Nature Conservancy (USA), over $7million was raised in the first 10 years of the project. The World Land Trust also raised 1.3million Euros from the EU for forestry research and development projects for the Programme for Belize.

The World Land trust went on to successfully raise funds for land acquisition in the Philippines, Costa Rica, Brazil, Ecuador and Argentina, and is currently considering proposals from India, Bolivia and other parts of the world. Last summer the WLT was involved in a training programme, funded by USAID to establish land trusts in Uganda. And because of its experience and expertise, has recently been contacted to create an interactive web site for the Forestry Research Programme of DFID.

Since the formation of the World Land Trust, there have been several other organisations using similar marketing techniques, but most of these revolve around single projects, and apart from The Nature Conservancy in the USA, none have a truly international operation. An essential part of the WLT's style of operations is that all its project involve a local non-government organisation (NGO), with ultimate responsibility. In order for the projects to be sustainable in the long term, the WLT believes that ownership must lie with local NGOs.

A wide range of information relating to the Trust is now posted on its web site or in eBulletins: www.worldlandtrust.org

*John Burton was the former Exec. Secretary of Fauna and Flora Preservation Society (now FFI) and founder of the TRAFFIC network, and a member of the IUCN/SSC; Bruce Coleman was (and still is) the owner of the Bruce Coleman Picture Library; David Pedley was a solicitor who had been Friends of the Earth Lawyer, and was a member of IUCN's Environmental Law Commission, and Jerry Bertrand was the President of Massachusetts Audubon Society and is now Chairman of BirdLife international.

For more information, contact: John Burton
CEO
World Land Trust
jab*at*worldlandtrust.org (To avoid spam, we cannot show the email address in full. Please replace *at* with the symbol @ in your email address field.)
Web site: http://www.worldlandtrust.org

 
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