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Tuesday, July 07, 2009:

Networking for Elephant Corridors 

When we launched our Appeal for conserving orang-utans it was an immediate success, and went on to raise over £50,000. We recently launched a JustGiving fundraising page for our Elephant corridors, and the response has been slightly underwhelming -- and this is despite the fact that a donor has offered to double all donations. The fundraising page was created in response to Simon Barnes' article in The Times which gave a very positive account of all our work with the Wildlife Trust of India.

So any ideas as to why we are not receiving a good response? The elephant corridors have been shown to work, and it is a cost effective way of saving this magnificent animal. So can I ask any readers of this blog to pass on the good news? It's a great window of opportunity. Donate £100, the government will give over £25, and we will also get another £100, making a total of £225. It's a no-brainer. But we need your help. On MySpace, Facebook, Twitter or anywhere else, please spread the word, and keep going back to the JustGiving to check how the fundraising is going. The great thing about raising funds on JustGiving is that the overheads for the WLT are extremely low -- a donation of £5 is cost effective (and so of course is one of £5000). So please get networking.

Posted by John Tuesday, July 07, 2009
 
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3 Comments:

I can think of a few reasons John:
(1) The web team haven't finished the web pages that will promote the appeal yet! (This is underway.)

(2) Because of (1) the appeal is not currently featured on the WLT website home page, so it isn't very visible.

(3) Because of (1) we have also not promoted it extensively on Facebook and the other social media sites yet.

(4) The JustGiving site has been broken for the last couple of weeks, making it difficult for supporters to donate.

Give it time - with some better exposure the appeal should start attracting interest.

All that said, we would of course welcome help with raising awareness of this appeal - the best form of promotion is when it's recommended by a friend, so if you care about the future of elephants, tigers and other wildlife in India, please spread the word.

- Helena, WLT web information manager

By  Helena Akerlund, at 07 July, 2009 10:46  

Here's one viewpoint:
It does kinda gall me that India (the government, the people) does not fund this themselves.
Why are westerners being asked to fund a project that Indians should surely be eager on every level (environmental, humanitarian, cultural) to see happen?
If the modern state of India can afford nuclear weapons, huge arms spending, mega-dams, space-programs - all within a rush to industrialise, can a few ruppees not be found for the few last elephants?
Or is ecological wealth just a western habit?

By  Dominic Belfield, at 07 July, 2009 15:16  

Dominic is of course right. And the Indian people (government)are funding a lot of conservation work as well. But there is also I suppose a sort of colonial guilt -- we in the west are largely responsible for starting the rush to destruction. While I agree with Dominic, I also feel the situation is so dire that we should all do what we can before it is too late. It often takes a long time to mobilise conservation action in India, but the Wildlife Trust of India (our partner NGO_) is small and efficient.

By  John, at 07 July, 2009 16:00  

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