The Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS) opened an office in Brussels in 2011 to increase its engagement with the European Union and its three institutions, namely the European Commission, European Parliament, and EU Council of 27 Member State governments, in support of WCS’s conservation programmes. In September 2018, WCS EU was formed, a Belgian international nonprofit association, which assumed all the operations of the former Belgian branch office.
WCS EU aims to influence EU policy initiatives and develop long-term partnerships with relevant organisations, governments and institutions to improve our conservation impact. It does so by drawing upon WCS’s global field expertise and experience to identify, formulate, and articulate policy positions on issues such as wildlife trafficking, CITES and integrating wildlife into EU development aid programmes, and sharing this information with decision-makers.