Over 45 participants from 17 countries representing Government Agencies, NGOs, donors, Intergovernmental and UN Agencies, attended the presentations made by representatives of the WOW partners.
Prof. Nick Davidson, Deputy Secretary General of the Ramsar Convention, chaired the meeting and also represented the UNEP/AEWA and UNEP/CMS Secretariat. He congratulated all WOW implementing partners and donors for the impressive successes and notable achievements of this initiative. “A very strong collaboration among a wide range of partners was established through the WOW. This provides a strong legacy for the future of flyway conservation initiatives” said Davidson.
One of two innovative conservation tools being launched this year by the WOW project, the Flyway Training Kit is designed to build capacity to plan, implement, monitor and engage in effective flyway-scale conservation of migratory waterbirds and wetland habitats in Africa and Eurasia.
The result of a broad collaborative effort among many donors, partners and training institutes across the African-Eurasian region, the Flyway Training Kit will be available in English, French, Arabic and Russian. The package includes three modules with comprehensive text, case studies and exercises supported by ready-to-use presentations, as well as accompanying CDs with a range of additional material. The kit is designed to assist in targeted trainings that can be customized by topic as they relate to flyway conservation, wetland management and migratory waterbird conservation.
The new Flyway Training Kit is a unique resource in flyway-scale conservation and represents an important step towards meeting core strategic objectives of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands and AEWA.
Dr. George Owiti from the Kenya Wildlife Service Training Institute concluded the presentations by officially presenting the very first copies of the Flyway Training Kit to the representatives of The GEF (Global Environment Facility), UNEP/GEF, the Government of the Federal Republic of Germany and to the Secretariats of the Convention of Migratory Species (CMS), African-Eurasian Waterbird Agreement (AEWA), and the Ramsar Convention who are all committed to the conservation of migratory waterbirds and their critical habitats.
The WOW Project contributes significantly to several of the CBD 2020 targets, including establishment of representative “flyway” networks of protected areas and wider landscape, national capacity building, awareness raising and integration of biodiversity values into national planning and strategies, and preventing extinction of threatened species. The WOW also contributes to the CBD Programmes of Work on Protected Areas, Inland Waters, and Marine and Coastal Biodiversity.
Note to Editors:
The Wings Over Wetlands (WOW) UNEP-GEF African-Eurasian Flyways Project is funded by The GEF, the German Government, UNEP-AEWA and many other donors. The project is a joint effort between UNEP-GEF, Wetlands International, BirdLife International, UNEP-AEWA, the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation, the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, UNOPS, UNEP-WCMC and a range of other local partners along the African- Eurasian flyways.
The area covered by the initiative includes all 118 Range States of the UNEP-administered African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbird Agreement, covering all of Africa, all of Europe, south-west Asia (including the Middle East and Central Asian States), Greenland and the Canadian Archipelago.
For more information on the WOW project please visit: www.wingsoverwetlands.org
Or download our latest Project Newsletter: Flyway Conservation at Work - Across Africa and Eurasia which also contains further information on the WOW Flyway Training Programme & Flyway Training Kit.
The full Flyway Training Kit will be made available electronically in PDF Format on 14 May 2010 at: www.wingsoverwetlands.org/flywaytrainingkit
Copies of the Flyway Training Kit are available for purchase through Wetlands International by contacting Umberto.Gallo-Orsi@wetlands.org
For further information, please contact:
Camillo Ponziani, Operations Manager, +49 228 815 2471, camillop@unops.org
Florian Keil, Communications Officer, +49 228 815 2451, fkeil@unep.de
Umberto Gallo-Orsi, Wetlands International WOW Project Coordinator, +39 0141 85 63 63, Umberto.Gallo-Orsi@wetlands.org