Recovery projects for 100 critically endangered and extinct-in-the-wild species across the world are set to receive new funding under a conservation initiative announced Aug. 4.
Re:wild and the Bezos Earth Fund, both U.S.-based environmental organizations, created the Phoenix Species Project and committed $100 million each, for a total of $200 million, to the project.
The project’s steering committee said each species will likely receive between $500,000 and $1 million for the duration of the five-year project.
Among the 100 species are Mexico’s Charco Azul pupfish (Cyprinodon veronicae), which went extinct in the wild in 1997 after its habitat dried up completely due to a devastating drought. Another is Madagascar’s golden-crowned sifaka (Propithecus tattersalli), a critically endangered lemur whose population has declined by roughly 80% amid rampant deforestation. With new funding, local NGOs will work to reconnect the fragmented forests that the lemurs need to survive.
A male Charco Azul pupfish. Image courtesy of Barbara Nicca.
