World Wildlife Day celebrated on 3rd March 2018

World Wildlife Day is celebrated in 2018 under the theme “Big cats: predators under threat".

Big cats are among the most widely recognized and admired animals across the globe. However, today these charismatic predators are facing many and varied threats, which are mostly caused by human activities. Overall, their populations are declining at a disturbing rate due to loss of habitat and prey, conflicts with people, poaching and illegal trade. For example, tiger populations plummeted by 95% over the past 100 years and African lion populations dropped by 40% in just 20 years. But a range of measures are underway to arrest this decline. In an effort to reach as wide an audience as possible, the expanded definition of big cats is being used, which includes not only lion, tiger, leopard and jaguar -- the 4 largest wild cats that can roar - but also cheetah, snow leopard, puma, clouded leopard, etc. Big cat species are found in Africa, Asia, and North, Central and South America, representing a virtually global distribution.

Over the past century we have been losing big cats, the planet’s most majestic predators, at an alarming rate. World Wildlife Day 2018 gives us the opportunity to raise awareness about their plight and to galvanize support for the many global and national actions that are underway to save these iconic species.

World Wildlife Day 2018 was celebrated on 3rd March 2018 in the premises of Nandankanan Zoological Park. The theme for this year 2018 was Big cats: predators under threat. Shri Jayant Kumar Das, Deputy Director, Nandankanan Zoological Park, Shri Anjan Kumar Mohanty, ACF (SM) and Shri Amulya Kumar Parida, ACF (VM) attended in this awareness programme. World Wildlife Day is an opportunity to celebrate the many beautiful and varied forms of wild fauna and flora and to raise awareness of the multitude of benefits that conservation provides to people. This celebration was attended by visitors, students, staffs, guides and representative of print and electronic media.

An interactive quiz programme on “Wildlife” was conducted by Shri M.R. Pattnaik R.O Security & Maintenance, Shri Kumar Behera, R.O.S.P, Shri Rajesh Kumar Mahapatra, Biologist and Shri Milan Kumar Panda, Education Officer, Nandankanan. Prizes were distributed amongst the winners of quiz programme, which was highly appreciated by the participants.

Finally, a signature campaign programme was done in 3 different places of Nandankanan Zoological Park to raise awareness amongst the people.