The World’s Rarest project began in 2010 – the year proclaimed by The United Nations as the International Year of Biodiversity. It is a not-for-profit initiative that aims to highlight the plight of the most threatened species on Earth and to raise funds to support their conservation.
The World’s Rarest project will focus initially on
birds and contribute to BirdLife International's Preventing Extinctions Programme. The project started with the launch of an
exciting international photo competition, aimed at providing the images for a new book entitled The World’s Rarest Birds. The response to the first photo competition was fantastic and The World’s Rarest project team is now delighted to announce the winners.
We would like to say a very big Thank You to all the photographers who kindly submitted their images.
Thousands of wonderful images were submitted to the competition and production of the book is now well underway. There are, however, still 26 species for which no images were submitted but which we believe may have been photographed. The species concerned are listed here. If you have photographs of any of these species – even if they are transparencies – we would be delighted to hear from you!
The World’s Rarest Birds is the successor to the Rare Birds Yearbook, which highlighted the Critically Endangered species and was published in 2007 and 2008. This proved to be very effective in raising funds to support BirdLife's Preventing Extinctions Programme.
The World’s Rarest Birds will have a wider remit – it will cover the 382 Endangered species in addition to the 189 that are Critically Endangered, many of which are on the verge of extinction. It will also cover four species that now only exist in captivity and feature the 62 that are Data Deficient. The book will define the status of each of these 637 species and describe the threats they face and what is being done to save them.
The World’s Rarest Birds is due to be published by WILDGuides in 2012. It will be a beautifully illustrated book featuring hundreds of photos taken by bird photographers and ornithologists from across the world. These photos will be selected from the entries into our international photo competitions, the winning entries from which will be awarded prizes generously donated by the main sponsors - Minox and Lynx Edicions.
