Walsall Football Club is supporting WWF's #WorldWithoutNature campaign.
On World Wildlife Day (3 March 2021) WWF will join some of the world’s best-known corporations, NGOs and sports teams in, including Walsall Football Club, by removing nature from their branding in an action that aims to highlight the dramatic loss of biodiversity globally and the social and economic risks it poses.
For the first time in its 60-year history, WWF will remove the iconic panda from its logo for the day, while many famous brands including Aston Villa, West Bromwich Albion, Wolves, Hootsuite, PG Tips and Brewdog will also remove symbols of nature from their logos to highlight the emptiness of a world without nature.
“For the first time in 60 years of acting for nature, we've taken the panda out of our logo. Our iconic panda is one of the most recognised symbols of the conservation movement, and taking it away is a symbolic move we've made to mark World Wildlife Day, “ said Felicity Glennie Holmes, Executive Director, Communications and Marketing at WWF International. “We want to show what a world without nature would look like, because in less than 50 years, human activity has resulted in wildlife populations plummeting by an average of 68% - and with every part of nature that we extinguish, we lose another important link to human and planetary health.”
“Today we’re joining forces with some of the world’s best-loved brands to remove nature-related images from our logos to show how empty a #WorldWithoutNature would be. Globally, we need to reverse our direction and start restoring nature. And we need governments around the world to seize the opportunities this year to take action, so that we avert the risk of nature disappearing for good and our natural world thrives.”
Global populations of mammals, birds, amphibians, reptiles and fish have suffered an average two-thirds decline in less than half a century, according to WWF’s Living Planet Report 2020. The report also shows that if the world carries on with “business as usual”, rates of biodiversity loss seen since 1970 will continue between now and 2050. These losses would at best take decades to reverse, and further irreversible biodiversity losses are likely, resulting in a planet that cannot support current and future generations of people.
Today’s campaign is a coordinated effort from The campaign was originally the brainchild of One Minute Briefs, created on World Wildlife Day last year. The idea received widespread praise on social media and has now been brought to life with support from the Voice for the Planet coalition which includes WWF, Conservation International, The Nature Conservancy, the International Union for Conservation of Nature and the RSPB.
Later this year, governments from around the world will meet to agree a new global agreement for nature, like the one we have for climate. WWF is calling on global leaders to step up to the challenge of delivering an ambitious global plan to tackle biodiversity loss and set nature on the path to recovery this decade. Members of the public can show world leaders they care about a more sustainable future for all by adding their voice for the planet.
Iain Beable, Social Marketing Strategist for EMEA at Hootsuite, said: "We are incredibly proud at Hootsuite to show our support for World Wildlife Day as part of the #WorldWithoutNature campaign. The protection of the Earth is arguably one of the most paramount matters of our time. It's important to remember that Earth does not belong to us, we belong to it, and we have a responsibility to ensure its protection for the generations to come."