THE WORLD WILDLIFE FUND is an international foundation which exists to save the world's wildlife and wild places. Its President is Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands. Its address is Löwenstrasse 1, Zurich 1, Switzerland.
The International Trustees of the Fund believe that man has responsibilities of trusteeship for the natural world over which he now exercises such sweeping power. How do these responsibilities equate with other human responsibilities? The ending of all forms of human suffering is clearly of paramount importance. We must never waver in the fight against disease, hunger, the threat of war and every other kind of disaster and human misery. We must strive to make a world worth living in for everyone.
But is a world without wildlife and wild places worth living in Even when mankind is free from want and fear, will our children's grandchildren thank us if we have sealed off great wild areas of the earth from the sun with bricks and mortar, concrete and plastics? Will they have to ask: "What was a wild animal?" or: "What was a wild place?"
When there is an unavoidable collision between the survival of man and the survival of wildlife, human interests must clearly prevail. It is the fund's thesis however that such collisions are rare - that in most cases a little thought, ingenuity, and goodwill can permit the coexistence of man and wildlife. Most of the species exterminated by man in historical times need not have become extinct if anyone had bothered about it.
The World Wildlife Fund is not campaigning for animals versus man. Conservation is for man, for the lone-term benefit of humanity, and to ignore it is short-sighted and improvident. There is a close link between medical science and natural science, and an even closer link between the achievement of freedom from hunger and the conservation of wildlife, because both have to do with the proper use of the land and its priceless resources.
