The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) is a US nonprofit, tax-exempt, private organization established in 1895 that saves wildlife and wild places by understanding critical issues, crafting science-based solutions, and taking conservation actions that benefit nature and humanity. With more than a century of experience, long-term commitments in dozens of landscapes, presence in more than 60 nations, and experience helping to establish over 150 protected areas across the globe, WCS has amassed the biological knowledge, cultural understanding and partnerships to ensure that vibrant, wild places and wildlife thrive alongside local communities. Working with local communities and organizations, that knowledge is applied to address species, habitat and ecosystem management issues critical to improving the quality of life of poor rural people whose livelihoods depend on the direct utilization of natural resources.
WCS established a country program in Mozambique in 2012 with two primary objectives:
• Increase the protection of Niassa Special Reserve, a vast landscape in the north of the country, and improve the conservation status of its elephants through co-manage of the Reserve in partnership with Mozambican Government; and
• Strengthen national-level protected area management by helping to improve policies and reinforcing the government’s ability to implement wildlife crime legislation through strategic engagement with government agencies in Maputo.