Today, rewilding initiatives and people across the world will celebrate World Rewilding Day with the theme #RewildingTogether. Rewilding Europe’s European Rewilding Network, which has just seen its membership reach 100, showcases the power of collaborative action in scaling up the impact and benefits of nature recovery.
Nelleke de Weerd
United for nature recovery
World Rewilding Day, which takes places on March 20 every year, was launched in 2021 by the Global Rewilding Alliance. Today, it will see rewilding initiatives and people from six continents come together again to raise awareness of rewilding and the need for nature recovery around the globe, with the theme #RewildingTogether.
The need for nature and the wide range of benefits it provides has never been greater. This year, Rewilding Europe aims to demonstrate how joining forces to rewild now is our best hope of realising a world where we can all thrive. And what better way to celebrate than by announcing that membership of our European Rewilding Network has now reached 100.
“The aim of the network is to bring together and empower rewilding initiatives from across Europe, so for it to reach this milestone on this year’s World Rewilding Day is a particularly special and significant moment,” says Julia Mata, Rewilding Europe’s Upscaling Manager. “The European Rewilding Network is the perfect showcase for how collective rewilding action can amplify the scale, impact, and benefits of nature recovery. What the members of the network are doing together is a real inspiration.”
Frans Schepers
Empowering collaborative action
At Rewilding Europe we recognise that our work is part of a broader European rewilding movement. As part of this movement, many great and inspirational rewilding initiatives have already developed over the last few decades, with more continuing to mushroom across the continent.
The aim of the European Rewilding Network is to bring these initiatives closer together, empowering each network member with the information and tools to be more successful in their rewilding efforts. All network members can access our European Wildlife Comeback Fund, for example, which provides funding for the reintroduction of keystone species, and our Natural Grazing Facility, which works to scale up natural grazing by brokering the demand and supply of wild herbivores such as horses and European bison.
Nelleke de Weerd
Enhancing the network
The addition of six rewilding initiatives from across Europe has boosted European Rewilding Network membership to 100, with 29 European countries now represented. Together, these initiatives are rewilding over 5 million hectares of land and sea.
The Laguna del Re initiative from Italy is focused on rewilding the Laguna del Re Oasis, a biodiverse wetland located on the Adriatic coast northeast of the city of Foggia. About 30 hectares of coastal lagoon and 150 hectares of Mediterranean salt steppe have already been restored, making the oasis suitable for priority bird species, such as the pygmy cormorants, ferruginous duck, and other waterbirds. Moving forwards, the team will work to incorporate adjacent areas that have been abandoned, promote socio-economic development through regenerative agriculture, and develop nature-based tourism.
Launched in 2021, UK-based Wild Ingleborough is a multi-partner, landscape-scale conservation initiative focused on creating a wilder future for an area of the Yorkshire Dales. With the assistance of volunteers, the team are working to rewild around 1,200 hectares of upland, helping a wide range of wildlife species to thrive by restoring well-connected habitats such as blanket bog, heath, scrub, woodlands, and flower-rich limestone grasslands. The restoration of bogs and woodland will boost carbon storage, a shift toward slower intensity grazing will provide healthy returns for farmers, while local people and visitors will benefit from the wilder landscape.
The Sicily-based Collettivo Rewild Sicily initiative is a non-profit organisation working to make the largest island of the Mediterranean a wilder place through practical grassroots action. Their community-based efforts focus on restoring natural processes such as the free flow of water and natural grazing, preventing catastrophic wildfire outbreaks, and promoting nature-based tourism, regenerative agriculture, wildlife monitoring, and human-wildlife co-existence.
Based in Bourg-en-Bresse in eastern France, the Rivières Sauvages (Wild Rivers) initiative is working to restore and protect the last remaining wild waterways in France and Europe. These rivers are awarded the initiative’s “Wild Rivers Site” label. So far, Rivières Sauvages has worked with 30 other initiatives to enable the protection and rewilding of 800 kilometres of waterway.
The “Salty westcoastal rewilding – follow the sturgeon into the sea” initiative, which is based in Sweden, is managed by Sportsfiskarna (the Swedish Anglers Association). In June 2024, with financial support from Rewilding Europe’s European Wildlife Comeback Fund, the initiative oversaw Sweden’s very first reintroduction of Atlantic sturgeon, with nearly 100 juvenile fish released into the Göta River, near the city of Gothenburg. Moving forwards, the team are aiming to establish a viable sturgeon population in the river by releasing more fish, as well as replant eelgrass meadows, create no-take fishing zones, raise environmental awareness, and promote more sustainable fishing practice.
Founded in 2022, the Pioneers of our Time initiative is working to rewild 100,000 hectares of the Muga Valley in the Spanish Pyrenees through an integrated, holistic approach that takes account of environmental, economic, and social factors. The team are working on forest regeneration, wildlife corridor creation, wildfire prevention, the restoration of vulture populations, and the reintroduction of species such as otters, tortoises, eagles, and large grazers. They are also developing nature-based tourism, with activities such as vulture watching already up and running, and fostering human-wildlife co-existence.
Join us
Today is the perfect day to feel inspired, think wilder, and act now to scale up rewilding and the wide-ranging benefits it offers. Whether you’re a big business or backyard gardener, there’s never been a better time to embark on a rewilding journey. From citizens, students and entrepreneurs, to land managers, policymakers and scientists, there’s room for everyone to join the burgeoning rewilding movement and make a positive difference. As the European Rewilding Network shows, working together is the best way to take rewilding to the next level and deliver a more liveable and prosperous world for all.
