This archive brings together 265 stories about wildlife recovery, protected lands, habitat restoration, and the communities driving conservation forward. From endangered species rebounds to new national parks and Indigenous-led stewardship, these articles document real, verifiable progress happening around the world. If you want evidence that protecting nature is working, this is where to look.
Albert National Park opened in 1925, carving out protected wilderness across the volcanic highlands of the Belgian Congo — the first national park on the African continent. American naturalist Carl Akeley had lobbied hard for it after meeting mountain gorillas in the Virunga highlands, and was later buried within its boundaries. A fraught beginning, and an enduring one.
Although individual countries designate their own national parks differently, there is a common idea: the conservation of ‘wild nature’ for posterity and as a symbol of national pride. As of 2023, there are over 6500 national parks worldwide.
In 1662, English writer John Evelyn stood before London’s Royal Society and warned that England’s forests were vanishing under the weight of shipbuilding, iron-smelting, and careless felling. His paper Sylva called not just for restraint but for active replanting — one of the earliest formal Western arguments that nature must be tended, not simply taken.
