Mediterranean work in Ramsar COP10
Posted on Thursday, November 26th, 2009
During the 10th Conference of the Contracting Parties (COP) of the Convention on Wetlands, held in Changwon (20.10-04.11.2008), the South Korean Authorities made great efforts to promote the cultural values of the country and its wetlands. This was effectively achieved through exhibitions and performances that presented a broad variety of Korean traditional and contemporary arts.
Of particular significance was the inauguration by the Mayor of the city and the Ramsar Secretary General of the Changwon Ramsar Culture Centre at the Junam wetland, devoted to the cultural aspects of wetlands at an international level and more specifically at a national level, i.e. the Republic South Korea.
On 03rd November 2008, a workshop organised by Wetlands International-Japan brought together experts from the region who presented case studies of culture in Asian wetlands, e.g. Japan, Malaysia, Nepal and South Korea.
The next day, the Ramsar Culture Working Group organised a meeting on ‘Culture and wetlands: Progress and Guidance’. During the meeting, Ramsar Award winner Sansanee Choowaew presented the work done in this field in Asia. Dave Pritchard, also a Ramsar award winner, introduced the CD-ROM publication ‘Culture and wetlands: A Ramsar guidance document’, produced by the Ramsar Culture Working Group. Finally Professor Koichi Sasagawa referred to the conclusions of the Asian workshop, which was followed by a substantive discussion.
During the meeting, its organiser and chair Thymio Papayannis presented the work done by Med-INA in the Mediterranean, focussing on the recent publication Action for culture in Mediterranean wetlands. The book, which was distributed to all the Contracting Parties and to selected experts, raised considerable interest and provided the basis for future collaboration and networking.
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