From Tigers To Solar Power: What Turns Decline Around
Hope, Tipping Points And Recovery
WWF's Living Planet Report 2026 tracks 35,803 monitored populations of 5,790 vertebrate species and finds an average fall of 73% between 1970 and 2022. The report also records recoveries. Wild tigers rose from about 3,200 in 2010 to around 5,700 in 2025, and the green sea turtle was moved from Endangered to Least Concern after 50 years of work across some 80 nesting countries.
The Living Planet Pulse condenses the report for teachers. It explains what the index measures and what its headline figure does not mean, sets out the energy, food and finance systems that drive most biodiversity loss, and shows where each sits on the path towards a positive tipping point. It also brings together 24 cases from the report in which people turned decline around.
Teachers can set the tool for ages 9 to 13, ages 14 to 18 or adult learners, and choose from seven activities. Each case and activity prints as a two-page lesson sheet, one page for learners and one for adults, mapped to GreenComp and the SDG targets. Every figure gives the report page it comes from.
The Living Planet Pulse
Select, Classify, Prove
The Living Planet Pulse
WWF's Living Planet Report 2026 follows 35,803 monitored wildlife populations and finds an average fall of 73% since 1970. It also documents species that have recovered and argues that hope, practised as a process, can tip the energy, food and finance systems driving the loss. This tool condenses the report for teachers: what the index shows, what is working, and seven ways to bring it into a classroom.
Built from the Living Planet Report 2026: The Science Of Hope (WWF, October 2026), with every item mapped to GreenComp (JRC, 2022) and SDG targets. Figures checked against the report on 12 October 2026, with page numbers given so you can check them too.
73%Average Decline
24Cases Of Hope
7Activities
0SDG Targets
Read The LabelsNot everything here carries the same weight.Report Data marks measured trends from the Living Planet Index and the other indicators in the report. Report Example marks case studies the report cites; its own references give the original sources. WWF Recommendation marks the report's calls for action, which are the position of a conservation organisation, not agreed policy. 169to1 Mapping marks our own links to GreenComp and the SDGs.
Set Up For Your Class
Two choices tailor the tool. Your choice of learners changes the discussion questions and activity adaptations throughout. Adult Learners covers teachers, parents, colleagues and community groups, and matches page 002 of every lesson sheet. Your role suggests a first move.
Which Learners Will Take Part?
What Is Your Role?
What This Tool Brings Together
The Living Planet Index
The index tracks the average change in size of 35,803 monitored populations of 5,790 vertebrate species: mammals, birds, fish, reptiles and amphibians. It is compiled with the Zoological Society of London.
Report, chapter 1, pages 22 to 23.
The Science Of Hope
The report treats hope as a process with four parts: a goal, a credible pathway, agency and resilience. It shows the pattern at work in recoveries of tigers, bluefin tuna, southern African elephants and green sea turtles.
Report, chapter 2, pages 35 to 43.
Positive Tipping Points
Energy, food and finance drive most biodiversity loss. The report places each on an S-curve: energy is accelerating, while food and finance are still in the enabling phase and need to tip before 2030.
Report, chapters 3 to 5, pages 45 to 100.
Why GreenComp And The SDGs
GreenComp names Promoting Nature (1.3) and Futures Literacy (3.1) as sustainability competences, and the report's idea of agency sits close to Political Agency, Collective Action and Individual Initiative (4.1 to 4.3). Every trend, case, system and activity in this tool is tagged with the competences it builds and the SDG targets it relates to, so the report can sit inside existing science, geography and citizenship planning. Select any chip to see the links.
Teacher's And Student's Notes
Two-page guides for running the tool with a class. Both are also on the Pack tab.
Terms Used In This Tool
What The Index Shows
Between 1970 and 2022, the monitored wildlife populations in the Living Planet Index fell by an average of 73%. The figure is an average of relative change, so read the box below before using it with learners.
The Global Index
73%
Average fall in monitored populations, 1970 to 2022 (73.2%, with a range of 67% to 78%). That is an average decline of 2.5% a year.
Report, page 22. Report Data
Half Are Holding On
50%
About half of the populations in the index are stable or increasing. The gains are outweighed by the size of the losses elsewhere when the global average is calculated.
Report, pages 22 to 23. Report Data
Extinctions Prevented
48
Since 1993, conservation action has prevented the extinction of an estimated 32 bird and 16 mammal species.
Report, page 32. Report Data
By Ecosystem
The global index averages three indices. Freshwater populations have fallen furthest.
Average change 1970 to 2022, with the average yearly decline. Drawn by 169to1 from the report's figures, page 24.
By Region
Regional indices cover land and freshwater populations. Regions that had already lost much of their wildlife before 1970, such as Europe and North America, show smaller declines from a lower starting point.
Average change 1970 to 2022. Drawn by 169to1 from the report's figures, pages 26 to 30.
What The Index Tells Us, And What It Does Not
Four Indicators, One Direction
The report sets the index beside three other measures. They look at biodiversity from different angles and point the same way.
What Drives The Loss
Three direct drivers account for 67% of biodiversity loss across land, freshwater and the sea, according to the IPBES figures the report uses. The shares are relative impacts, not absolute amounts.
Report, page 43, from the IPBES Global Assessment (2019). Drawn by 169to1. Report Data
The Systems Behind The Loss
The report argues that conservation alone cannot reverse a decline driven by three systems: energy, food and finance. Its answer is to push each system past a positive tipping point, where change starts to reinforce itself.
Why It Matters Now
Nature Holds Up The Economy
US$58tn
About half of global GDP in 2023 came from work that depends in some way on nature.
Report, page 7. Report Data
Money Flows The Wrong Way
33 to 1
In 2023 around US$7.3 trillion flowed into activities that harm nature, against US$220 billion for activities that protect or restore it. The ratio is 169to1's division of the report's two figures.
Report, pages 10 and 79, citing UNEP. Report Data
Limits Already Crossed
7 of 9
The planet has crossed seven of the nine planetary boundaries that define safe conditions for the Earth system, and the food system causes most of that pressure.
Report, page 10. Report Data
How A Positive Tipping Point Works
Change in a complex system often builds slowly out of sight, then speeds up once a threshold is crossed. The report describes three phases along an S-curve.
After the report's Figure 3.2 and Figure ES.2, pages 12 and 47. Drawn by 169to1.
The Three Systems
Open each system to see where it sits on the S-curve, the figures behind it, the levers the report names and what a fair transition needs.
Feedbacks That Speed Change Up Or Hold It Back
Five Signs A System Is Tipping
What 2030 Asks For
The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, agreed in 2022, aims to halt and reverse biodiversity loss by 2030. The report says three things have to change for it to deliver. WWF Recommendation
Timeline
The Science Of Hope
The report draws on psychology to treat hope as a process, not a feeling. It is not optimism, which expects a good outcome whatever you do, and it is not false hope, which ignores the evidence. Real hope uses evidence and changes course when a pathway closes.
After the report's Figure ES.1 and Figure 2.1, pages 9 and 35. Drawn by 169to1.
Three Kinds Of Agency
Hope Is Not Equally Available
The report notes that poverty, discrimination, displacement and insecure land rights narrow the routes some people have to act. It treats low agency in these settings as a realistic reading of unfair systems, not a personal failing, and cites evidence that rights, recognition and a real role in decisions improve both well-being and outcomes for nature (page 37).
24 Cases Of Hope
Every case below comes from the report. Each has a plain-English summary, what made it work, what to watch, the nearest system and a question for your learners.
Classroom Activities
Seven lesson designs built on the report's own ideas: reading the index, hope as a process, the S-curve, feedback loops, food, finance and tracking progress. Each shows what you need, the steps, an adaptation for your chosen learners and the competences it builds. Add any of them to a Lesson Pack to print.
GreenComp Competences
GreenComp has 12 competences in four areas. Select a competence to read what it means in plain English and see every case, system and activity in this tool that builds it.
Competence tags on cases, systems and activities are 169to1 mapping, not a WWF or EU classification.
SDG Targets
The report's targets come from the Global Biodiversity Framework, but the systems it describes reach across the 2030 Agenda. This view shows the SDG targets linked to items in this tool. Select a target to see what connects to it. A solid chip means a direct link, a dashed chip a supporting one.
Target links and plain-English wording are by 169to1. 169to1 is independent and has no UN affiliation.
Get Involved
Routes for learners to add to the evidence, follow the targets and take their ideas beyond the classroom, and places to find the full source material.
Your Lesson Pack
Cases and activities you have added, printed as lesson sheets: page 001 for learners, page 002 for adult learners.
Your pack is empty. Use Add To Lesson Pack on any case or activity.
Every lesson has two A4 pages. Page 001 is for school learners. Page 002 is for adult learners, including teachers preparing the lesson and adult groups in workplaces and communities. Printing opens the sheets on their own page. Use the Print button at the top, or on a phone use Share and then Print to save a PDF.
Teacher's And Student's Notes
Teacher's Notes And Checklist
Two pages: what the tool is, learning objectives, key words, the nine tabs, a timed hour and an optional second hour.
Student's Notes And Checklist
Two pages for each group to record choices and reasons, tab by tab, with a final checklist.
Select, Classify, Prove
