Скачать или смотреть MaximsNewsNetwork: GLOBAL TIGER SUMMIT in ST. PETERSBURG, RUSSIA (THE WORLD BANK)

MaximsNewsNetwork: 18 November 2010 -- THE WORLD BANK: Washington, D.C. - At the beginning of the 20th Century, 100,000 tigers roamed the wild but today that number has plummeted to 3,200; the Global Tiger Summit in St. Petersburg, Russia, will bring together the countries that still have wild tigers, along with conservation and development partners including the World Bank in a summit will run from November 21 to 24th in St. Petersburg.

World leaders will undertake specific commitments with the goal of doubling tiger numbers to 7,000 by 2022 and protecting their habitats.

The habitats in which the big cats live are vanishing and tigers now occupy only seven percent of their original range.

Illegal poaching, illegal wildlife trade, loss of habitat through conversion, encroachment and land degradation are all causing the decline in numbers of wild tigers. Considerable resources in tiger protection have already been invested, and there have been successes.

It's been shown that tiger populations can recover if habitats can be protected, within and outside protected areas, and if poaching of tigers and their prey is stopped.

But while there are some important successes, there's still a lot to do. Habitat degradation and fragmentation continue. Conservation efforts are continually being undermined by poaching and illegal trade.

It is now recognized that saving the wild tiger is a global challenge. To succeed, it will take a committed partnership of national governments and organizations pooling their expertise and passion.

SOUNDBITE (English) Robert B. Zoellick, President, World Bank:
"Tigers are what is referred to as an umbrella species, what that means is if you save the tiger you also have to save its prey populations and you are going to have to preserve the biological diversity of its habitats, so by saving the tiger we save a lot more than the tiger. But second, the tiger is such an iconic species it's a representative of sports teams, of companies, kids around the world grow up learning about tigers because of their power and their grace, that if we can't save the tiger you have to ask yourself what our chances are of saving many other species."

"So we aim to expand the reserves, we need to expand the ranger population, we have to make this economic for communities, so they don't feel the need to try to kill the tigers and ultimately we have to get at the poachers, we need to see poachers behind bars , not tigers behind bars."

SOUNDBITE: (English) John Seidensticker, Head, Conservation Biology, Smithsonian Institution:
"Tigers were declared an endangered species forty years ago; and we continue to loose tigers; and so unless we try something new, the World Bank what they bring to the table is a whole new perspective. The World Bank is one of the primary financiers of biodiversity conservation activity, people don't know that."

"We haven't had this kind of showing political will ever, and to me this is probably a once in a lifetime event."

...... ( THE WORLD BANK ) ............................................

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