World Wide Fund for Nature : 50 Years

Date of Issue : 30 August 2011

This issue celebrates the 50th anniversary of the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) with the release of its second joint Australian territories stamp issue.

The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) celebrates its 50th anniversary in 2011. Officially registered as a charity on 11 September 1961, it was conceived to raise funds for the conservation of nature. With a mission to stop degradation of the natural environment and to preserve biodiversity, it has grown into one of the largest independent conservation networks worldwide.

Minisheet

Australian Joint Territory Issue : WWF – 50 Years

The stamps feature following animals :

Quokka (Setonix brachyurus) looks a little like a dumpy kangaroo, giving rise to its alternative common name of Shorttailed Wallaby. Herbivorous and mainly nocturnal, it is endemic to the south-western corner of Western Australia and most numerous on Rottnest and Bald Islands.

Christmas Island Shrew (Crocidura trichura) is extremely rare, possibly extinct. It was thought that this forest-dwelling mammal had vanished by 1908, but after an unconfirmed sighting in 1958 it was rediscovered in 1985, when two individuals were caught.

Dugong (Dugong dugon) gets its name from the Malay language, in which duyung means "lady of the sea" or "mermaid." It is known to occupy the waters of the Indo-Pacific, from the east coast of Africa to the central Pacific. A single male inhabiting the waters of Cocos (Keeling) Islands since 2002 demonstrates the species is capable of long-distance migration to colonise new environments.

Southern Elephant Seal (Mirounga leonina) inhabits mainly subantarctic regions. It spends most of its time at sea, usually between the north edge of the pack ice and the subantarctic convergence. It returns to land to breed, to give birth and to moult.

 

Indian themes on foreign stamps

                                                                             - Kenneth Sequeira

Vicente Ferrer  - Humanitarian Activist who worked for the poors in South India

Country / Post : Spain

Date of Issue : 8 October 2010

Primary theme : Religions & beliefs (Famous religious people)

Subject : Personalities - Vicente Ferrer

Stamp issuing authority : Correos Y Telegrafos SA

 

Vicente Ferrer Moncho  was a philanthropist (a candidate for the 2009 Nobel Prize) who spent his life working to improve the lives of the poor in the mission he founded in Southern India. Today the Vicente Ferrer Foundation carries out humanitarian projects in Andhra Pradesh, bringing aid to over 2.5 million poor people, many of whom are considered Dalit or untouchable. He was born in 1920 in Barcelona, Spain & died in 2009 in Anantapur, Andhra Pradesh, India.

He arrived in India in 1952 as a Jesuit missionary. After deciding to increase his focus in helping the poor, in 1958 he created with a group of followers in Manmad, Mumbai. "Rural Development Association". This organization started with twelve acres of land and a school. Although, due to the crisis in the rural area, many peasants wanted to emigrate, Vicente Ferrer encouraged local peasants to dig wells and told them “I will pay you with wheat and oil.” He gave water pumps with credits and with no interests or guarantees. The organization reached 3,000 wells.

After the publication of the article “The silent revolution” in 1968 in the Illustrated Weekly, one of the most read Indian magazines at the time, he was expelled in 1968 by the Indian authorities. A year later, with the blessings of Indira Gandhi, he was granted permission to return so that he could continue his work in the poverty-stricken city of Anantapur. Eventually, he left the Jesuits but continued his humanitarian work.

After his return, he started another project in Anantapur ; he again set up irrigation systems, this time in a desert area that was completely barren. The cooperative work method that he instituted there goes by the name of "linked brotherhood": help is given to each peasant in digging his own well, with material and food for the length of the work. In 1998 he was awarded Spain’s Prince of Asturias Award for Concord.

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