As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, zoos around the world are on the brink of insolvency. Many are facing the need to euthanize animals. Most modern zoos play a crucial role in conservation, holding breeding populations of the most endangered species. In some cases the species are extinct in the wild — zoos are the last remaining hope. The larger zoos are also forces for global conservation efforts, protecting wild places and the species that live in them, and conducting crucial conservation research.

Because people gather there, zoos will be among the last to be able to re-open, and many will not be able to survive that long. Even the biggest are warning of impending insolvency. If that happens, animals will die and conservation efforts collapse.

The major oil companies, as part go their efforts to promote sustainability, should collectively step up and create an emergency fund to help zoos and aquariums survive until they are able to fully reopen to the public. The cost will be relatively trivial against their balance sheets, yet will avert a conservation disaster. Unlike a pandemic, extinction is forever.