Wetlands are exactly what they sound like – according to the WWF, they are places where ‘the land is covered by water—salt, fresh, or somewhere in between—either seasonally or permanently’, and they function as their own ecosystem.
However, up to 87 percent of the world’s wetlands have been lost over the last 300 or so years, so clearly preserving them is high up on the environmental agenda.
That’s where the Ramsar Convention comes in. It’s an intergovernmental treaty that provides a framework for conserving usage of wetlands and their resources, and in the 64th meeting, which took place in January, 31 new cities were added to the Wetland Accreditation Scheme.
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Each city was included to recognise its ‘outstanding efforts in conserving and sustainably managing urban wetlands’, according to Smart Water Magazine, which is vital as wetlands are facing an ever-growing list of problems, such as the pollution and degradation caused by population growth.
The Wetland Accreditation scheme, thanks to these new inclusions, now spans across 74 cities in 27 different countries.
One of the new inclusions is Arles, which has a freshwater wetland called Marais de Beauchamp located in Parc Naturel Régional des Alpilles, featuring reed beds, temporary pools and a rich array of fauna species, some of which are in decline across the rest of France.
Another newly-accredited ‘wetland city’ is Balagna in the Philippines, which is home to Balagna Wetland and Nature Park, a vast sanctuary for migratory birds that operates almost as a natural, open-air museum. Read on for the full list of wetland cities.
These are the newly accredited ‘wetland cities’
- Argentina – Trelew
- Belgium – Mechelen
- Botswana – Kasane-Kazungula, Shakawe
- Chile – Valdivia
- China – Chongming, Dali, Fuzhou, Hangzhou, Jiujiang, Lhasa, Suzhou, Wenzhou, Yueyang
- France – Abbeville, Arles, Hampigny
- India – Indore, Udaipur
- Iran – Babol, Bandar Kiashar, Gandoman
- Japan – Nagoya City
- Morocco – Mehdya
- Philippines – Balanga City
- Poland – Poznan
- Republic of Korea – Gimhae, Mungyeong
- Serbia – Novi Sad
- Switzerland – Geneva
- Zimbabwe – Victoria Falls
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