Nature Breaking

Today's episode highlights a new initiative that aims to reduce the environmental footprint of leather production. Leather, as we all know, is sourced from cattle. And right now, cattle ranching for both beef and leather production is a major driver of deforestation, particularly in biomes such as the Amazon, Cerrado and Gran Chaco. In Brazil, for example, cattle ranching drives twice as much deforestation as the production of soy, palm oil, and wood products combined. It's a major problem that we need to overcome if we're going to save critical ecosystems, conserve species, and secure a stable future for our planet.

That's where the Deforestation-Free Leather Fund comes in. This new initiative, launched by WWF in March, gives companies that use leather in their products a chance to make a difference. This episode features an interview with the leader of that initiative, Fernando Bellese, about what exactly he hopes the fund will achieve. Companies or individuals interested in joining this effort can get more information in the links below.

Links for More Info:

Fernando Bellese bio

Deforestation-Free Leather Fund

BLOG: Leather Now Has a New Role: Helping to Prevent Deforestation

CHAPTERS:

0:00 Preview

0:31 Intro

2:04 Fernando's background

4:19 Difference between sustainable vs. unsustainable leather

8:10 Why is a fund needed?

13:50 How the fund works

28:21 Why should companies get involved?

31:27 How can consumers help?

34:25 Outro

Each year, millions of migratory eastern monarch butterflies embark on a breathtaking 3,000-mile migration from North America to the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve in Mexico, where they hibernate in the towering Oyamel fir forests. But this iconic species is in trouble. WWF's research conducted with conservation partners since the early 2000s shows that the eastern monarch population has been trending downward for years. And while the latest report released by WWF and the Government of Mexico found that the population nearly doubled during the 2024-2025 winter, this latest finding is still far below the long-term average.

In this episode of Nature Breaking, host Seth Larson speaks with Court Whelan, Chief Sustainability Officer at Natural Habitat Adventures, about the wonders of the monarch's migration, the threats they face, and the conservation efforts bringing hope for their future. Discover how you can help protect these incredible pollinators, from planting native milkweed to utilizing your own personal "superpower" to advance conservation efforts. Join us for an inspiring conversation that highlights why monarchs are worth saving and what we can all do to ensure their survival.

Links for More Info:Court Whelan bio

Natural Habitat Adventures

WWF: Eastern monarch butterfly population nearly doubles in 2025

WWF Milkweed Finder

CHAPTERS:

0:00 Preview

0:15 Intro

1:58 Court's backstory

4:53 Monarch migration

13:42 Inside an expedition to the monarch's winter home in Mexico

16:45 A "snow globe" of monarchs

23:10 Threats to monarchs

24:48 Why should we care about saving monarchs?

30:37 Hope for the future of monarchs

33:14 Outro

In this special World Wildlife Day episode of Nature Breaking's "Headlines & Trendlines" series, hosts Seth Larson and Hayley Lawton share uplifting conservation success stories that prove we can make a difference for endangered species.

Discover how mountain gorillas have rebounded from critically endangered to endangered status with populations now exceeding 1,000 in Rwanda, Uganda, and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Learn about Bhutan's remarkable 40% increase in snow leopard numbers—these elusive "Ghosts of the Mountain" are making a comeback thanks to strategic conservation efforts. We also explore how cutting-edge AI technology and camera traps are helping monitor wildlife recovery after Australia's devastating 2020 bushfires, and how black rhinos have grown from just 2,400 to over 6,000 animals through targeted conservation initiatives.

These success stories demonstrate that while many species face threats from habitat loss and poaching, collaborative conservation work is creating real impact. Join us to celebrate these wildlife victories and find hope for our planet's biodiversity.

Links for More Info:

WWF's mountain gorillas page

International Gorilla Conservation Program

Snow leopard conservation in Bhutan

AI & camera traps in Australia

Black rhino conservation study

CHAPTERS:

0:00 Preview

0:16 Intro

1:45 Seth & Hayley's bucket list animals to see in the wild

4:07 Mountain gorillas

7:02 Snow leopards

10:27 Ghosts of the Mountain

11:59 How AI & camera traps helped identify wildlife after Australia's bushfire in 2020

14:36 Black rhinos

17:56 Hayley's black rhino encounter story

19:18 Closing reflections on World Wildlife Day

21:32 Outro

Last fall, the United Nations convened a major bi-annual conference focused on protecting the world's biodiversity – that's the vast array of animals, plants, waters, and other natural systems that sustain our planet and our very existence. The conference, known formally as the 16th meeting of the Conference of the Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity, or COP16 for short, succeeded on some fronts. But it fell short in other areas, and left some critical work unfinished. In particular, the conference ended without an agreement about how the nations of the world will finance the work that needs to happen to halt and reverse nature loss by 2030. So next week, the conference will reconvene in Rome, Italy, to resume those negotiations and hopefully nail down a plan to raise the funds required for nature's future.

Today's episode features a conversation with Andrew Deutz, WWF's managing director for global policy and partnerships. Andrew is an expert on conservation finance and he'll walk through the key issues facing negotiators as COP16 resumes.

Links for More Info:

Andrew Deutz bio

CBD COP16.2

WWF COP16 Explainer

REPORT: "Financing Nature: Closing the Global Biodiversity Financing Gap"

CHAPTERS:

0:00 Preview

0:21 Intro

2:06 Refresher on COP16 in Colombia

4:01 Progress for Indigenous peoples

5:08 Progress on nature targets

6:28 New fund for digital sequence information

9:45 Disagreements on finance plan

13:16 How much money do we need to protect nature?

20:37 Where will nature funding come from?

22:09 Key hurdles for negotiators in Rome

27:36 What's at stake for people in these negotiations?

30:24 Outro

Last month a series of wildfires spread across communities in Los Angeles and left a trail of destruction in their wake. Tens of thousands of people were forced to evacuate their neighborhoods. Over 15,000 homes and other structures were burned. And at least two dozen people were killed. It's well documented that climate change contributes to making fires like these worse. And it also exacerbates other hazards like droughts, floods, and storms. So what can local leaders in LA and in other communities in the US and around the world do in the wake of these extreme events to address systemic risks and proactively reduce catastrophic disasters? Today you'll hear from Anita van Breda, WWF's senior director for environment and disaster management. Anita has decades of experience working with communities affected by natural hazards, and she'll share her insights on disaster risk management and recovery in the wake of this most recent tragedy in LA.

Links for More Info:

Anita van Breda bio

Web Story: What the 2004 tsunami taught us about disaster recovery

Op-Ed: Why there is no such thing as a "natural" disaster

Nature & Nature-Based Flood Management Guide

Green Recovery & Risk Reduction

CHAPTERS:

0:00 Preview

0:21 Intro

2:03 Lessons from the 2004 tsunami

5:09 Factors that contributed to LA wildfires

8:16 Disaster recovery tips for LA and other communities

11:49 Role of nature in disaster prevention and recovery

18:19 Parting advice to community leaders

21:10 Outro

We're kicking off the new year with another edition of Nature Breaking's "Headlines & Trendlines." Seth is joined once again by Hayley Lawton as they count down four of their favorite conservation wins from 2024: major progress for bison restoration, a commitment to raise $1 billion to save wild tigers, innovations in "environmental DNA" that could change the way we approach conservation, and the first-ever photograph of a rare bird species. They'll also close with a discussion of what they're most excited about heading into 2025.

Links for More Info:

Web Story: Conservation Highlights of 2024

Tribal Buffalo Lifeways Collaboration

Sustainable Finance for Tiger Landscapes Conference

eDNA Pilot Study in Bhutan

New Britain Goshawk photo

CHAPTERS:

0:00 Preview

0:12 Intro

1:36 Personal milestones in 2024

3:42 Bison restoration

5:54 Raising funds to save wild tigers

7:50 Environmental DNA

10:49 New Britain Goshawk photo

12:16 Things to watch in 2025

14:41 Outro

A major UN conference to negotiate a global treaty on plastic pollution just ended without an agreement. But efforts may resume in 2025 to get a treaty over the finish line. In this two-part episode, you'll hear first from Erin Simon, WWF's vice president for plastic waste and business, about what happened at that conference in Korea (known as INC-5) and what comes next for the global fight against plastic pollution. Then, in Part 2, you'll hear from Sheila Bonini, WWF's senior vice president for private-sector engagement; and Kevin Keane, president and CEO of American Beverage (ABA) – the trade association representing the nation's non-alcoholic beverage industry. Sheila and Kevin's teams have been working together for the last five years to find different ways to achieve material circularity – which means that all the plastic, as well as other materials like aluminum, that get used are collected and remade into new products. Sheila and Kevin will tell us about what's working, what hurdles still remain, and how they plan to advance their mission regardless of whether a global plastics treaty gets adopted.

Links for More Info:

Erin Simon Bio

Sheila Bonini Bio

Kevin Keane Bio

WWF Plastics Page

WWF-ABA Partnership

Sustainability Works Blog: "Five Years of Progress: WWF and ABA's Partnership for Practical Solutions"

WWF Statement on INC-5 Outcome

Chapters:

0:00 Preview

0:24 Intro

2:22 Refresher on UN treaty process

5:39 Consensus as a weapon

8:52 What happened at INC-5

11:55 WWF's 4 "must-haves" in a final treaty

13:53 Stumbling blocks in negotiations

17:26 Conclusion of negotiations

23:05 What happens next?

26:27 Role for companies

31:28 Interlude, Part 2 begins

33:07 Explaining the American Beverage Association

34:41 Why does ABA want to address plastic pollution?

38:08 WWF-ABA partnership

41:41 Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) policies

46:54 Consumer awareness

48:39 ABA's EPR principles

54:39 Building consumer confidence about recycling

56:30 Lessons for other industries

59:17 Plastic pollution is a bipartisan policy issue

01:02:41 WWF-ABA Lessons Learned

01:07:12 Outro

Ahead of this year's Thanksgiving holiday, today's episode revisits a conversation we originally recorded in 2022 about avoiding food waste when you get together to cook those turkeys and side dishes. This topic matters because some 316 million pounds of food is expected to go to waste this Thanksgiving alone. And when we waste food, we also waste all the water, land, and energy that went into producing it. Alex Nichols-Vinueza, WWF's director of food loss & waste, joins this episode to explain how our food system ends up wasting an estimated 40% of food produced globally (1:20). He then talks about how this problem manifests on Thanksgiving (8:07), and shares some simple steps that people can take to prevent food from going to waste during the holidays (9:04). Last, Alex talks about how schools and businesses can be partners in limiting food waste (11:52), and how changes in federal policies could drive nationwide improvements (15:30).

Links for More Info:

Alex Nichols-Vinueza bio

BLOG: Serving Up Tips for a Waste Free Thanksgiving

How schools can become Food Waste Warriors

Industry Coalition Supports the Food Date Labeling Act

This week marks the start of the annual UN climate conference, known as COP29, in Baku, Azerbaijan. COP29 is being dubbed the "finance COP" because one of the main focuses of this year's conference will be to set a new goal for global climate finance and to lay out a plan for achieving it. The last time countries set a climate finance goal was 2009, at COP15 in Copenhagen, where wealthy nations committed to provide $100 billion annually to help developing nations deal with climate change. 15 years after the $100 billion target was established, we now know a lot more about the effects of climate change and how much it costs to address. Estimates vary on how much funding is now needed, but suffice to say that it's a lot higher than we thought it was back in 2009. So, where will this funding come from? And what's a reasonable new goal for countries to work toward in the years ahead? Joining me today to talk through these and other questions is Tim Juliani, WWF's director of US corporate climate engagement. Tim is a veteran of previous climate COPs and he'll tell us what he's keeping an eye on heading into Baku.

Links for more info:

Tim Juliani bio: https://www.worldwildlife.org/experts/tim-juliani

WWF's COP29 Expectations Paper: https://wwfint.awsassets.panda.org/downloads/cop29_expectations_24oct24.pdf

Tim Juliani's Substack, "Yet Another Climate Substack": https://timjuliani.substack.com/

Chapters:

0:00 Program note

1:07 Intro

3:00 COP29 context in global process

4:59 COP15 in Copenhagen story

7:02 Definition of NDCs and stocktake

7:43 COP29 is the "finance COP"

10:17 Climate finance challenges

14:04 Finance goals at COP29

16:55 Role of companies

24:53 Goals for NDCs at COP29

28:07 Closing call to action

29:46 Outro

Today, rather than interviewing a WWF expert in-dept on a specific topic, we're trying something new. Seth will be joined by Hayley Lawton from WWF's social media team for something we're calling: Headlines & Trendlines. You'll hear Seth and Hayley briefly summarize some recent news articles and talk about what they mean for climate and nature. This week they discuss two big issues that are driving headlines: this year's devastating hurricane season, and the ongoing UN biodiversity conference. They also touch on the recent pygmy hippo craze that had everyone on Earth talking about baby Moo Deng.

Links for More Info: New York Times, A Tale of Two Hurricanes Finds More That Differs Than Is the Same: https://www.nytimes.com/2024/10/13/us/hurricane-milton-helene-florida-north-carolina.html

Vox, We need $700 billion to save nature: https://www.vox.com/down-to-earth/378249/cop16-biodiversity-finance-gap-seven-hundred-billion

WWF pygmy hippo facts: https://www.worldwildlife.org/stories/why-are-pygmy-hippos-so-small-and-6-other-pygmy-hippo-facts

Chapters:

0:00 Preview

0:27 Intro

2:25 Hayley introduces herself

4:10 NY Times hurricane article

5:56 Hayley & Seth react to recent hurricanes

9:28 Vox nature finance article

10:36 $700b is a lot of money

12:28: COP16 outcomes

13:25 Moo Deng and pygmy hippo facts

15:23 Outro