A future for all: the need for human-wildlife coexistence
This joint report between the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and WWF titled 'A future for all - the need for human-wildlife coexistence', reveals that globally, conflict-related killing affects more than 75% of the world’s wild cat species, as well as many other terrestrial and marine carnivore species such as polar bears and Mediterranean monk seals, and large herbivores such as elephants. According to the report, which featured contributions from 155 experts from 40 organisations based in 27 countries, human-wildlife conflict is as much a development and humanitarian issue as it is a conservation concern, affecting the income of farmers, herders, artisanal fishers, and Indigenous peoples, particularly those living in poverty and without resilience; interfering with access to water for communities competing with wildlife for local water sources and driving inequality where those who pay the price for living with wildlife do not receive the benefits of coexistence, among other things. Yet despite being so strongly linked to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), human-wildlife conflict continues to be overlooked by policymakers.
