East Asia-Pacific Flyway
 Suncheon-si / Ramsar
Suncheon Bay Ramsar site, near Changwon, South Korea is a key site for migratory waterbirds.
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The East Asia-Pacific Flyway spans East Asia, from Siberia to Australasia, and is the most poorly known of the world’s migration routes. Extending across the most densely populated part of the world, migratory birds face extreme pressures within this flyway.
Asia supports over 50% of all people on earth, placing natural habitats such as wetlands under enormous pressure. Consequently, the East Asia-Pacific Flyway contains about 50 Globally Threatened migratory waterbird species. Migratory songbirds in Asia are suffering from over-exploitation of habitats and trapping for the cage bird trade.
The Pacific region spreads over more than 38 million square kilometres of ocean – an area three times larger than mainland China or the United States of America. The Pacific region is critically important for migratory seabirds. However, centuries of over-exploitation and the impacts of introduced predators have destroyed most seabird colonies in the Pacific.
The BirdLife International has Partners in the following countries and territories across the Asia and Pacific regions: Nepal, India, Sri Lanka, Russia, Japan, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Philippines, Thailand, Myanmar Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, Australia, the Cook Islands, French Polynesia, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Palau and Samoa.
Conserving Waterbirds
Migratory waterbirds, and the wetland habitats they require to complete their annual journeys, are under threat. For example, Saemangeum - one of the most important shorebird sites within Asia’s Yellow Sea - is being reclaimed for development, putting hundreds of thousands of migratory birds under threat.
BirdLife believes that substantial declines are taking place in shorebirds populations in the East Asian-Pacific Flyway, and that the world’s largest reclamation project at Saemangeum could be driving Critically Endangered Spoon-billed Sandpiper Eurynorhynchus pygmeus towards extinction. More... BirdLife are campaigning to halt to the development, and also striving to save all Critically Endangered birds with the Preventing Extinctions Programme. More...
BirdLife Partners are also undertaking many projects to monitor and conserve waterbirds along the flyway. For example, Shorebirds 2020 is a major new program is well underway at Birds Australia (BirdLife Australia) and is helping to gain a better understanding the relationship between habitat quality and threats on the distribution and abundance of waders. More...
 BirdLife Fiji
The relative isolation of the Ringgold Isles makes them a a safe haven for many seabirds species.
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Identifying and Protecting Sites
BirdLife International has identified a total of 2,293 IBAs in all 28 countries and territories in the Asia region - many important for migratory birds. However, 43% of the region’s IBAs lie wholly outside of formal protected areas. Consequently, BirdLife has produced two documents which outlines the threats and provides actions to effectively conservation these sites. Click to read more about ‘Saving Asia's Threatened Birds’ and ‘Asian Important Bird Areas’.
Saving Seabirds
The Pacific region is critically important for seabirds – many of which are migratory. However, most threatened seabirds are found in developed countries - such as Australia, New Zealand and Hawaii – and are benefiting from a range of conservation activities from intensive site management to regional policy initiatives.
However, seabird colonies in the tropical Pacific islands are not well understood and BirdLife are currently undertaking a project to locating important seabird colonies (Important Bird Areas) in French Polynesia and Fiji. More… Furthermore, BirdLife are also restoring globally important seabird colonies in the Pacific by the removal of rats and other invasive predators. More…
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