18/07/2012
Eleventh meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP11) of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands -The 9 Japanese wetlands were newly registered-
The 11th meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP11) of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands was held in Bucharest, Romania, from 6-13 July 2012.
The Ramsar Convention (The Convention on Wetlands of International Importance, especially as Waterfowl Habitat) is an international treaty for the conservation and sustainable utilization of wetlands. The convention was developed and adopted by participating nations at a meeting in Ramsar, Mazandaran, Iran on February 2, 1971. The 162 contracting parties and observers participated in the 11th meeting to discuss the 3-year projects to be conducted until the 12th meeting and sustainable tourism of wetlands, based on the meeting theme “Wetlands: home and destination.”
The 9 Japanese wetlands were newly registered as Ramsar Sites in conjunction with the 11th meeting. The 9 wetlands were included in the List of Wetlands of International Importance on July 3, 2012, and the number of Ramsar Sites in Japan totaled 46.
The Secretariat of the Ramsar Convention awarded the certificates for registration to the related local authorities on July 7, 2012.
The newly registered Japanese wetlands are as follows.
○Onuma (Hokkaido)
○Watarase-yusuichi (Ibaraki Prefecture, Tochigi Prefecture, Gunma Prefecture and Saitama Prefecture)
○Tateyama Midagahara and Dainichidaira (Toyama Prefecture)
○Nakaikemi-shicchi (Fukui Prefecture)
○Tokai Hilly Land Spring-fed Mires (Aichi Prefecture)
○Lower Maruyama River and the surrounding rice paddies (Hyogo Prefecture)
○Miyajima (Hiroshima Prefecture)
○Arao-higata (Kumamoto Prefecture)
○Yonaha-wan (Okinawa Prefecture)
