Environment Forum
Global environmental challenges
Can Indiana Jones help save tigers?
Indiana Jones and the World Bank sound like an odd couple to get anything done (“Quick, shoot that robber!” “Wait, we have to do a two-year feasibility study first!”) but are part of a new alliance trying to save the world’s tigers. (Read my colleague Leslie Wroughton’s fine story here)
Will it work? Tigers are under threat from loss of prey and habitats and a black market in tiger skins and bones.
And tiger numbers have plunged to about 4,000 today from more than 100,000 a century ago, according to the new International Tiger Coalition, led by the World Bank with backing from celebrities such as “Indiana Jones” star Harrison Ford, Bo Derek and Robert Duvall. Ford is a board member of Conservation International. 
A World Bank report warned that “if current trends persist, tigers are likely to be the first species of large predator to vanish in historic times.”
