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An Indian village went from hunting Amur falcons to being their biggest protectors. Here’s how conservationists can harness the power of persuasion

Diogo Veríssimo, University of Oxford and Sahila Kudalkar, Columbia University Wildlife conservation is an exercise in human persuasion. It may seem counterintuitive that we hold the keys to the survival of wildlife, but 98% of all threatened species are threatened exclusively by human activities such as pollution, invasive species or habitat loss. Influencing human behaviour … [Read more…]

From Media Buzz to Local Leadership: How Governance Transformed Amur Falcon Conservation in Nagaland

What Did We Do? We aimed to explore how a media-driven conservation campaign could evolve into a sustainable, community-based governance model. Our study focused on the case of the Amur Falcon hunting ban in Pangti, Nagaland, India. We wanted to understand the key factors that contributed to the successful transition from a top-down imposed hunting … [Read more…]

New video abstract!

Here is the new video abstract for the paper: Conservation fundraising: Evidence from social media and traditional mail field experiments. We compared three types of message frames (simple, seed money, and ecological). We found that the seed money frame, which emphasizes the amount already donated, increased the number of donors, whereas the ecological frame, which … [Read more…]

The second extinction of forgotten species

We made the cover of Current Conservation! A great feature article entitled “The second extinction of forgotten species” covering our paper on “Societal extinction of species” published a few months back. The idea of “societal extinction,” which is when a species disappears from collective memory and knowledge. This can occur in addition to biological extinction, … [Read more…]

As times and tastes change, Vietnam’s bear bile industry is fading away

What do consumers of a wildlife product do when a market closes? We mostly have no clue. Today we had a paper published on the intentions of bear bile consumers to the closing of the market in Vietnam. We sampled at seven areas across the country of Vietnam (total respondents = 2,463). We found low … [Read more…]

Blackfish: how captive killer whale documentary ended SeaWorld’s orca breeding programme

Laura Thomas-Walters, University of Stirling and Diogo Veríssimo, University of Oxford After its premiere at the Sundance Film Festival in January 2013, the documentary Blackfish reached nearly 21 million viewers within its first month of airing on CNN. The film tells the bleak story of Tilikum, a performing orca at the US marine park SeaWorld. … [Read more…]

How can we stop people wanting to buy illegal wildlife products?

Laura Thomas-Walters, University of Kent; Bob Smith, University of Kent, and Diogo Veríssimo, University of Oxford Conservationists have been working for decades to save species such as pangolins and rhinos from illegal hunting and trading. And, with fears that the coronavirus pandemic originated from the wildlife trade, there’s never been more pressure to find solutions. … [Read more…]

Coronavirus: why a blanket ban on wildlife trade would not be the right response

Dan Challender, University of Oxford; Amy Hinsley, University of Oxford; Diogo Veríssimo, University of Oxford, and Michael ‘t Sas-Rolfes, University of Oxford The early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic have been linked to a “wet” market in Wuhan, in the Hubei province of eastern China. Wet markets are common in Asia, Africa and elsewhere, selling … [Read more…]

The effect of knowledge, species aesthetic appeal, familiarity and conservation need on willingness to donate

NEW PAPER! Out in Animal Conservation and led by Piia Lundberg, this research looks into the drivers of online donations for species and ecosystem conservation in Finland. See the abstract below and get the PDF here: https://goo.gl/tN5TtS Abstract Environmental non‐governmental organizations (ENGOs) largely select flagship species for conservation marketing based on their aesthetic appeal. However, … [Read more…]