Workshop seeks safeguards for India’s unprotected IBAs

29-02-2008

BirdLife Partners from all over Southern Asia are in Mumbai, India, for a workshop on the conservation and livelihoods issues faced by Important Bird Areas (IBAs).

The workshop has been jointly organised by the Bombay Natural History (BNHS, BirdLife in India), BirdLife International Asia Region, TILCEPA (the World Conservation Union’s IUCN’s Theme on Indigenous and Local Communities, Equity, and Protected Areas), and Kalpavriksh.

The workshop will help develop strategy and actions to deal with issues linked with developmental threats, and livelihood dependency on IBAs.

India has 466 IBAs, of which 199 are outside the protected area network. Some that have no formal protection are conserved by IBA LCGs (Local Conservation Groups) organised by local communities. The workshop will explore to what extent the existing legal framework can be used to safeguard unprotected IBAs, and will also discuss success stories from community-conserved IBAs, to assess the feasibility of replicating such experiences in different parts of India.

“We will attempt to identify best practices and key lessons from Asia.” —Prashant Mahajan, BNHS

The workshop will be preceded by a meeting of the Indian Bird Conservation Network, (IBCN), which brings together NGOs, state government organisations and concerned individuals from all over India. Established in 1998 by BNHS in collaboration with BirdLife International and the RSPB (BirdLife in the UK), the IBCN promotes the conservation of birds and their habitats in India, and lobbies for the protection of IBAs. One of the leading membership networks in India, the IBCN has 85 organisational and 800 individual members.

The IBCN members will go on to join the workshop. BirdLife Partners and Affiliates attending the workshop to share their experiences include BANCA (Myanmar), BCN (Nepal), BCST (Thailand), FOGSL (Sri Lanka), Burung Indonesia, MNS (Malaysia), Haribon Foundation (the Philippines) and the BirdLife Cambodia and Vietnam Programme. Observers from the Royal Society for the Protection of Nature in Bhutan have been invited.

“This workshop is an attempt to gather the experiences from the region on LCGs and work on livelihood and equity issues,” said Prashant Mahajan of BNHS. “We will attempt to identify best practices and key lessons from Asia.”

Credits: BNHS