May 2024: Purnima Devi Barnum wins 2024 Whitley Gold Award!

Purnima Devi Barman, a wildlife biologist from India, was awarded the 2024 Whitley Gold Award to continue her work to protect the Greater Adjutant Stork – or ‘hargila’ in the local language – and its wetland habitat. Barman originally won a Whitley Award in 2017 to honor her work galvanizing local women to safeguard Hargila nests and change attitudes about these storks. Before her intervention, their numbers had dwindled to an estimated 450 birds in the state. The work of Purnima and her “Hargila Army” comprised of thousands of local women have helped quadruple the number of local birds to more than 1,800. Looking ahead, Purnima now wants to double the global population of the bird to 5,000 by 2030, working across the stork’s range in India and Cambodia.
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