As we swing into a new year of action for animals, we reflect on everything our supporters helped us achieve for wildlife in 2025.
Here are a few of the many lives you helped change, and save, in 2025
Credit: CFW (Top left), ASI/Taryn Slabbert (Top middle) KWP (Top right corner), ONCA Wildlife Sanctuary (Bottom left corner), WFFT (Bottom middle) and Umoya Khulula Wildlife Centre (Bottom right corner)
Drought mitigation projects
Climate change is taking its toll on Southern Africa, with longer dry seasons and less rainfall. Our work provides thousands of animals with fresh drinking water:
- In South Africa’s Limpopo Province, we helped fund the creation of a borehole for a herd of rescued elephants in the care of our partner, Hoedspruit Elephant Rehabilitation and Development (HERD). Climate change and other factors are causing frequent and worsening droughts, and we wanted to help give this special herd fresh, abundant water all year round.
- In Zimbabwe’s desperately dry Hwange region, our supporters helped us fund two life-saving water pumps for elephants and other animals battling lingering drought. This project supports the work of our partner, the Presidential Elephants Research Trust (PERT), by bringing water to a 7,413-acre (3,000-hectare) area bordering Hwange National Park – an area which had no other means of providing water during the dry season.
- In Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, we helped fund a borehole and water pumps for our partner, Matabeleland Animal Rescue and Equine Sanctuary (MARES), a refuge for over 100 injured, neglected and abused animals. Lingering drought had locked animals in a desperate state of hunger and thirst.
Advanced anti-poaching solutions
Illegal wildlife trafficking persists globally, affecting over 4,000 species but especially rhinos, pangolins and tigers in Africa and Asia respectively. A growing online market, particularly on platforms like Facebook, fuels the trade. We are helping to mitigate the crisis:
- In Zimbabwe, we contributed towards an anti-poaching drone for our partner, Zambezi Conservation Unit (ZamCon), which patrols high-risk poaching zones along the Zambezi River.
- We purchased AI-powered camera traps for our Zimbabwean partner, Victoria Falls Anti-Poaching Unit (VFAPU), to support its fight against the surge in lion poaching for the Asian market. Lion paws, heads, teeth and bones are especially sought-after as fake medicinal cures and curios.
- We helped our partner, Kariba Animal Welfare Fund Trust (KAWFT), with the emergency de-snaring of a helpless baby elephant calf, and equipped its team with vital tools for emergency de-snaring operations.
- The landlocked Asian country of Laos is a key trading hub for wildlife, and our partner there – the Laos Conservation Trust for Wildlife (LCTW) – has a massive job on its hands. We funded a drone for the team so it can effectively monitor the forests surrounding its sanctuary, where many rescued animals are released back into the wild.
Emergency rescue and disaster relief
Climate change, extreme weather, habitat loss and human-driven disasters are increasingly disrupting animals’ habitats and jeopardizing their lives. ASI is ready to step when animals need us most:
- In January, we provided emergency funding in the United States to Wetlands and Wildlife Care Center of Orange County (WWCC), which rescued and treated animals during Los Angeles’ catastrophic wildfires.
- We provided emergency funding to US big cat sanctuary Wild Felid Advocacy Center of Washington (WFACW), which had to destroy thousands of dollars’ worth of food after a bird flu outbreak killed 21 of its big cats, believed to have come from contaminated meat.
- When a severe flood destroyed our partner sanctuary, Turtle Survival Alliance (TSA), in Madagascar, we stepped up to help 5,000 fragile juvenile tortoises. Due to water exposure, these reptiles – critically endangered radiated and spider tortoises – were at risk of deadly pneumonia. Funds were used to evacuate them to TSA’s surviving shelter several hours away.
- Thanks to our supporters, we continue to help animals affected by the Ukraine war – long after many other organizations stopped. This year, we provided substantial funding to Wild Animal Rescue Centre (WARC), which rescues wild animals from the frontlines. We funded new tires for rescue vehicles, covered heating bills for animals during the bitterly cold winter, and – in partnership with the LionWatch Project – relocated three of their rescued lions to a permanent sanctuary in South Africa.
- In the war-torn Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), we funded critical communication devices for rangers from The Gorilla Organization, who are protecting the region’s last remaining gorillas. These critically endangered animals are caught amid the conflict and risk being poached for their meat by desperate, starving civilians.
- We contributed to round-the-clock care for infant wild animals orphaned by bushfires in South Africa. These injured and frightened animals, rescued by our partner, Friends of Free Wildlife (FFW), have no hope of survival without critical care and long-term rehabilitation.
- We provided funding to Sea Search, a group of scientists researching the devastating outbreak of rabies in the seal population of South Africa’s Western Cape. Our scientists explain the potentially far-reaching consequences of this outbreak here.
Through our supporters’ kindness and generosity, we helped thousands of animals across the world in 2025 – and with your continued support in 2026, we’ll help thousands more.
A heartfelt thank you from all of us at ASI, and all the animals whose lives you helped improve.
