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Welcome to send us photos of your country's Nature Reserves.

Sviatoslav Zabelin, SEU coordinator

Digest of Socio-Ecological Union International for March 31, 2023. №58

Bogdinsky-Baskunchaksky Nature Reserve is a Russian state nature reserve in the Akhtuba district of the Astrakhan region in the vicinity of Lake Baskunchak and Mount Bolshoe Bogdo, in close proximity to the state border of Russia and Kazakhstan.

It might surprise readers to learn that Britain even has temperate rainforests, but fragments of these habitats remain along the Atlantic coast – and this week a project launched to expand them. On Wednesday, the Wildlife Trusts, a conservation charity, embarked on a 100-year initiative to protect and enlarge Britain’s temperate rainforests, thanks to a £38m donation from the insurance firm Aviva. Rainforests grew all along the Atlantic coast of Britain hundreds of years ago, but now cover less than 1 per cent of the island. They are vital carbon sinks, bastions of biodiversity and inspire awe. With the climate and nature crises intensifying, restoring them is an obvious solution.

Image: Guy Shrubsole

 “These woods are magical and much loved by those who visit and live near them,” said Craig Bennett, chief executive of The Wildlife Trusts. “We’re looking forward to working with communities to bring back rainforests along the Atlantic coast.” Read more

The Tarímiat Pujutaí Nuṉka Reserve covers 1,237,395 hectares (3,057,671 acres) of Andean and Amazonian forests in the Morona Santiago province of eastern Ecuador. The area has cloud forests, sandstone plateaus, Amazonian lowlands and floodplain forests that are home to thousands of species, many of them endemic.

A member of a Shuar community in Morona Santiago. (Photo courtesy of Fabian Rodas/Nature and Culture)

The reserve is intended to help protect against drivers of deforestation like mining, logging and cattle ranching. Indigenous Shuar and Achuar communities participated in a thorough consultation process to ensure that the reserve was meeting their vision for the future of the area. Read more

Environmental campaigners scored a rare victory in Albania on Wednesday after authorities announced the creation of a national park to protect the Vjosa River, one of Europe's largest undammed waterways. For years, activists lobbied to save what they call Europe's last major "wild river"—one whose course is unaltered by industry or dams—recruiting A-listers like Leonardo DiCaprio to their cause.

The Vjosa and its tributaries will now enjoy the highest level of protection.

Spanning more than 400 kilometres (248 miles), the Vjosa and its tributaries will now enjoy the highest level of protection. "It is a transformational moment for the whole area and also for the future of communities around it, for the whole country," Rama told AFP. Activists agreed, saying the national park breaks new ground in the world of conservation. "It establishes, for the first time, a conservation concept where an entire river system is protected and not just individual sections of a river," said Ulrich Eichelmann, head of the Austria-based advocacy organisation RiverWatch. Read more

Chile declared some 100,000 hectares (247,100 acres) in the Gulf of Corcovado in Northern Patagonia a marine protected area, the highest category of protection.

Blue Whale. Image courtesy of Nicolás Muñoz.

The area is an important feeding and breeding ground for endangered blue whales as well as home to numerous other marine mammal species.

However, it represents only a small fraction of the blue whales’ range, so scientists say additional conservation efforts must continue. Read more

President Biden on Tuesday designated two new national monuments, putting nearly 514,000 acres off-limits to development as part of his pledge to protect 30 percent of U.S. lands and waters by 2030.

Joshua trees near the western edge of the proposed monument near Castle Mountains National Monument in Juan, Nev. (Kyle Grillot for The Washington Post)

The president signed proclamations to protect Castner Range, a former military training and testing site in El Paso, and more than 500,000 acres around Avi Kwa Ame (ah-VEE-kwah-may), a sacred tribal site in southern Nevada, according to the White House. Read more

The number of privately protected areas in South America has exploded over the past two decades, and today cover some 2 million hectares (5 million acres). Most of these areas are collectively owned by campesino communities or smallholder families, and many operate independently, without being registered. A study published in February 2023 concluded that the legal frameworks and support mechanisms for this type of protection area are largely deficient across the continent, making it difficult for independent actors to protect and maintain conservation areas.

The Sechuran zorro (Lycalopex sechurae), the smallest fox species in South America at an average of 3.4 kilograms (7.5 pounds), is a near threatened species and one of the four mammals identified as living in the Amotape Dry Forest Private Conservation Area. Image courtesy of Michell León.

 Experts told Mongabay that nongovernmental protected areas are crucial for reaching the Global Biodiversity Framework’s target of protecting 30% of Earth for conservation by 2030. Privately protected areas are relatively small compared to national parks but play a crucial role in integrating society into global conservation efforts, in education programs and protecting biodiversity in strategic regions, experts told Mongabay. Read more

Australia's environment minister declined to grant permission for a new thermal coal project owned by mining magnate Clive Palmer near the Great Barrier Reef. The Central Queensland Coal owned mine is in the Styx Coal Basin, just off the coast of central Queensland.

A man snorkels in an area called the 'Coral Gardens' near Lady Elliot Island, on the Great Barrier Reef, northeast of Bundaberg town in Queensland, Australia, June 11, 2015. REUTERS/David Gray/File Photo

"I've decided that the adverse environmental impacts are simply too great," Environment Minister Tanya Plibersek said in a video posted to social media. "The mine is an open-cut coal mine less than 10 km from the Great Barrier Reef, and the risk of pollution and irreversible damage to the reef is very real." Plibersek said her office received 9,000 public submissions on the issue in ten business days. Read more

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