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WWF and DFID – natural partners

Poverty and the environment are closely linked. Both WWF and the UK government’s Department for International Development (DFID) recognise that the world’s poorest suffer most when natural resources such as forests and water are degraded.

Globally, 70% of people living in poverty rely on natural resources for their livelihoods, so a healthy, functioning environment is fundamental to people’s well-being. Working with poor people can be the key to better management of natural resources.

Climate change in particular will affect the poorest and most vulnerable people the hardest – the very people least responsible for the problem.

© WWF-Canon / Michel Gunther

Working in partnership

DFID and WWF have worked together since 1986 to:

  • address the environmental concerns that matter to the poor
  • ensure poverty is reduced sustainably
  • achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), particularly MDG 7, which aims to ensure environmental sustainability.

WWF’s current partnership with DFID started in April 2008 and will run for three years. Under the agreement, DFID is contributing more than £12m to WWF programmes which aim to reduce poverty in Latin America, Asia and Africa and improve environmental governance at community, regional, national and international levels.

Our partnership aims to strengthen environmental governance to ensure positive environmental impacts and improve the well-being of people – especially poor and marginalised groups.

Environmental governance refers to the ways in which resources are allocated, how decisions that impact on the environment are made, and other political processes that relate to environmental goods and services. Striving for good environmental governance requires WWF to work on some of the main global challenges we face today, including poverty, climate change, consumption, trade and economic growth.

Self-assessment reports

WWF PPA Self Assessment 2010

WWF PPA self assessment 2009


WWF and DFID’s objectives

  • Civil society: ‘Role of civil society strengthened to ensure good governance and management of natural resources at local and national level in at least three countries’.

    Good environmental governance relies on a strong civil society. This partnership will strengthen the role of civil society at local and national levels in countries such as Nepal, Colombia, Brazil and India.
  • Climate change: ‘Strategies for low-carbon development pathways and climate change adaptation developed’.

    Climate change is the greatest threat to the environment and to efforts to reduce poverty. WWF is promoting low-carbon development, which will reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and we are finding ways to help communities and ecosystems adapt to the impacts of climate change.
  • Production, trade and consumption: ‘Production, trade and consumption in selected countries or sectors transformed to be more environmentally sustainable and equitable’.

    We are supporting developing countries in international trade negotiations to ensure a fair and sustainable agreement for trade in their natural resources. We are also working with businesses to improve their practices and policies.
  • Demonstrating impact: ‘Integrated systems for monitoring and evaluation, communication and lesson learning developed and implemented across the portfolio, and shared with DFID and other partners’.

    We need to understand the impacts of our work so we can learn effectively and build on our successes. We also need to demonstrate clearly what we are achieving with public money and communicate this widely. By gathering evidence and stories, we will bring good environmental governance to life.

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