Periodically new research or a news article exposes (again) why Nature Needs More was established in 2017: to lobby for system change to protect the tens of thousands of wild species caught up in international trade. Last week, Closing the Border on Australia's Domestic Elephant Ivory Trade, reconfirmed what the Australian Government has been unwilling to confront: Australia remains an international outlier, one of the few wealthy CITES countries without a comprehensive domestic ivory-market closure, despite efforts to close such markets dating back to 2016. And elephant ivory is not the only problem. As far back as 2012, European authorities identified the “road to Australia” as an important corridor for illegal rhino horn, following a dramatic increase in [...]

For decades, businesses and industries have profited from nature—extracting its resources, exploiting its genetic diversity, even building entire industries around biological wealth. If we are serious about making business pay a fair share of the costs of conserving the natural world it depends upon, the Cali Fund is a case study in how not to do it. The Cali Fund is a global biodiversity fund established under the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) to receive contributions from companies that use digital sequence information (DSI) derived from genetic resources. It was officially launched on 25 February 2025. Its purpose is straightforward: to ensure that the benefits generated from commercial use of genetic resources—particularly in industries such as pharmaceuticals, [...]

Watching HSBC’s mini-documentary, Monkey Busine$$, about the bank’s work to expose financial crime linked to the illegal wildlife trade, triggers the question, have we reached peak hypocrisy? This is not just about the company, but let’s start there, with the long list of HSBC’s penalties and fines for everything from anti-money-laundering deficiencies, fraud, banking violations, and the list goes on. And these aren’t historic violations – 15 penalty records are noted between 2020 and 2025. None of these violations are hard to find. Which begs the question, what due diligence was done before United for Wildlife agreed to appear in this HSBC promotional video?  It isn’t unusual these days for conservation organisations to seek collaborations with [...]

For too long it has been too easy for business to say they are offering conservation organisations a seat at their advisory table to help them make informed policy decisions regarding their environmental impacts. Conservation must face the fact that all they have ever been offered is a highchair. All this has created is a plethora of phantom solutions (offsets, credits, certifications, ESGs etc) and greenwashing to avoid the scale of government intervention needed to properly regulate the business of extraction of wild species for profit. These profits are being made by some of the wealthiest companies in the world, from luxury fashion and homewares to fragrances and pharmaceuticals. And let's not forget all the problems of the [...]

When cultures value people conditioned to not look into its dark corners, we shouldn’t be surprised when this backfires. So, what happens when it is OK to lack curiosity until it’s not?  Watching the Westminster and Whitehall panic over the Mandelson affair, and particularly the criticism of the two key characters, Keir Starmer and Olly Robbins, over their respective ‘lack of curiosity’ at key points in the timeline, is a perfect example of such a backlash. It comes as no surprise to read statements such as “The failures of process matter, but a series of judgment calls lie at the heart of this scandal”. These “judgment calls” resulted in people not looking into dark corners when it was [...]

Over 50 years, and especially the last 30 years, the CITES has faced a death by a thousand cuts. It has taken until CITES CoP20 for some stakeholders to finally realise that ignoring the predicament of this critically important regulator has brought it to the brink of what could be ironically called extinction. The CITES core budget hasn’t increased in 25 years, while the number of species regulated (on paper at least) has exploded. Celebrating adding more species for trade restrictions when it comes with no additional funding is insane. Particularly when there is an easy way of the CITES receiving $100 million in extra funding annually. As many of our readers and supporters know, Nature Needs More [...]

It has taken 6 years of lobbying to move the dial on just the first step of modernising the CITES regulator, namely trying to drag the CITES from its 1970s paper permits to a digital, real-time system which can more easily monitor supply chains. After Nature Needs More first published a 3-step process to modernise the CITES, Step 1. Electronic Permits, Step 2. CITES moves to Reverse Listing Model, Step 3. Business Pays cost of Regulation, we started lobbying the governments of signatory countries to implement a modern, digital trade permit system (Step 1). Modernising CITES from its current 1970s paper-based permit system was first discussed in 2002. When we started, in 2019, only 2 countries had done [...]

The current stories of what defines ‘cool’ and gives people status are killing the planet. New narratives are needed to save wild species and the natural world. Will 2026 bring the needed shift? The status-driven addiction to consumption is driving planetary collapse. At present this addiction is shared between all groups who are able to participate in consumer culture. Without being able to tell different stories about the elite groups propelling us collectively to planetary tipping points, and without creating new groups advocating an alternative based on generosity of spirit, the behaviour changes needed to pull us back from the brink cannot happen. Simply converting the energy powering unnecessary consumption from fossil fuels to renewables will never [...]

In 2017, when Nature Needs More decided that the illegal trade in wild species couldn’t be decisively tackled until the legal trade system under the CITES was modernised, we stumbled on the historic consideration of moving the CITES to a revise listing system. For clarity, under the CITES model established 50 years ago the default for any wild species is to allow trade. Trade can happen unregulated until those who are concerned that the (international) trade is undermining the survival of the species can prove that trade is a problem and get this accepted by 2/3 of the CITES signatory parties. Sometimes it can take decades before trading countries and businesses accept the need for any monitoring and [...]

Finally, some good news coming out of the CITES. In the days leading up to the start of CoP20, the map highlighting which countries are moving away from the obsolete 1970s paper permit system has been updated. It would have been frankly ridiculous for the CITES to reach its 50th anniversary CoP event without the absolute minimum step to show it can evolve with the times being in place. But for a long while it was looking like this was going to be the case. But in the last few days there has been a mini revolution. Firstly, for those of you who don't know this map, it is useful to understand that for some reason the CITES [...]