Good news inside

🐘 Open this one if you like elephants! 🐘

Happy New Year! We know your inbox is crowded this time of year, but we hope you can make space for a jumbo-sized piece of good news (or at least, use this as some quality resolution-procrastination time). We're thrilled to announce that not only did thousands of generous donors like you come together to help us meet our year-end matching gift challenge – raising over half a million dollars for elephants, tigers, and other vulnerable species – but Friday we got word of a true "game changer" for elephants: China will close its domestic commercial elephant ivory trade in 2017! Will you share this image on Facebook to help celebrate? It's sure to make everyone with a soft spot for elephants (and that's everybody right?) smile. Legal ivory markets fuel elephant ivory poaching and trafficking – to disastrous consequences for elephants. Just this summer, we learned there are less than 400,000 African savannah elephants left on this Earth – fewer than previously known and a 30% drop in just 7 years. We've never been in so much danger of losing elephants forever. Now, China's announcement means the world's largest market for elephant ivory is shutting down this year. Great news for elephants and bad news for poachers and traffickers who will soon have a harder time making a profit off their bloody trade. But this victory for elephants didn't come out of nowhere. It's the product of lots of hard work, including your emails, calls, posts, and donations. You are a key part of a movement that's turning the tide for elephants. Momentum for ivory bans is building all around the world. In 2016, IUCN voted to support the closing of all domestic ivory markets, and subsequently, the CITES Cop17 recommended that all countries close those markets. In addition, the United States enacted in 2016 a regulation to close its domestic elephant ivory market. We still have a long way to go. But with your continued support we – and elephants! – are starting to win. Thank you, and we wish you a happy and healthy new year! Sincerely, John F. Calvelli Executive Vice President, Public Affairs Director, 96 Elephants Wildlife Conservation Society

©2017 Wildlife Conservation Society 2300 Southern Boulevard, Bronx, New York 10460 718-220-5100 This email was sent to ignoble.experiment@arconati.us. If this isn't the best way to reach you, update your contact info here. Reaching you over email is the best way we have to keep in regular contact with supporters like you and letting you know what actions you can take to ensure a future for all wildlife like elephants, tigers, and gorillas which are being rapidly pushed toward extinction. Click here to unsubscribe from our email list, but remember, if you leave, it will be harder for you to stay involved with WCS and continue the work you've been a critical part of. You enable WCS to be on the frontlines of the fight to save Earth's most magnificent wildlife and the habitats critical to their survival, so we'd love to hear your thoughts about how we're doing. Send us any comments, feedback, ideas here. To watch a video that never fails to remind us how amazing wildlife is and why it's so important to fight for the future, go here. Thanks so much for your support. TERMS OF USE PRIVACY POLICY CHILDREN'S PRIVACY POLICY Having problems viewing this message? VIEW IN BROWSER