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Africa
African ecosystems are among the most diverse and productive wild lands in the world. Best known are the east and southern savanna systems, which teem with unparalleled populations of large migratory mammals. Across the continent's center spans a continuous block of equatorial rain forest second only to the Amazon in size. Offshore, rich, but fragile, coral reefs stretch from the Horn of Africa to the coasts of Kenya and Tanzania.
But amid this gallery of wildlife, Africa faces tremendous challenges. Extreme poverty, the highest human population growth rates in the world, limited economic opportunities, and rapidly changing political systems combine to create tremendous pressure on both people and natural resources. To face these challenges, the Wildlife Conservation Society has worked for decades with Africa’s governments, institutions and people to preserve its natural heritage for both wildlife and humans.
History of WCS in Africa
WCS has worked to safeguard Africa's great wildlife and wild places for the long-term benefit of the people of Africa, and the world, since 1920. During that year, William Hornaday-then-director of the Bronx Zoo- published the The Vanishing Game of South Africa and helped establish Kruger National Park. In 1959, George Schaller first attracted the world's attention to the mountain gorillas of the Albertine Rift. More recently, WCS created model conservation and ecotourism projects in Uganda's Kibale Forest and Rwanda's Virunga Volcanoes, and successfully passed responsibility for these projects to national institutions. In Zambia, the ADMADE and COMACO programs have demonstrated that wildlife can benefit local people, empowering them to become stewards of their resources. In 2000, Mike Fay's Megatransect focused the world's attention on the Congo Basin, mobilizing new resources and commitment. And in 2003, with the advice and support of WCS scientists, the Presidents of Gabon and Madagascar tripled the areas under protection in their nations.
WCS in Africa Today
Today, WCS's Africa program is the largest and most effective field conservation program on the continent, active in 20 countries from Gabon to Kenya and Sudan to South Africa and employing more than 900 dedicated individuals. Beyond the sheer size of its Africa program, WCS is proud of its commitment to work in the field regardless of hardship, to base conservation action on firm scientific understanding, to partner with local people, national governments, and other NGOs, and to find and implement solutions to Africa's greatest conservation challenges.
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