Signed by eighteen nations in 1971, the Ramsar Convention was the first international treaty on environmental conservation. Although its original mission was to conserve wetlands "as a contribution toward achieving sustainable development throughout the world," its efforts have expanded to consider the importance of wetlands in global climate change.

International organizations, including the International Union for Conservation of Nature, have worked to protect waterfowl since the beginning of the twentieth century. In 1962, Luc Hoffman and several international conservation groups called for an international convention on wetlands (DiMento, 2007). The group later known as Wetlands International spent the next eight years conducting meetings and drafting treaty language, guided by G. V. T. Matthews. The agreement formally titled the Convention on Wetlands of International Importance, Especially as Waterfowl Habitat was signed in the town of Ramsar, Iran, in 1971, and came to be known informally as the Ramsar Convention.

The Ramsar Convention was the first environmental treaty to consider both conservation and the "wise use" of natural resources. Contracting nations have agreed to employ national land-use planning, law, management and public education to work toward the wise use of all their wetlands; to identify and manage appropriate wetland areas for inclusion on the Ramsar List, an official List of Wetlands of International Importance; and to cooperate internationally to protect wetlands and inhabiting species that cross national boundaries. The Conference of the Contracting Parties (COP) meets every three years, and a smaller standing committee meets every year, to guide conservation efforts and measure progress (Hunt, 2004). Contracting parties can make use of convention consultants, grant funds, and other assistance.

The Convention on Wetlands and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) are linked in several ways. The UNFCCC's Kyoto Protocol article on land use, land-use change, and forestry, as well as the article on development and transfer of technology, directly affects the conservation of wetlands. The convention has passed a series of resolutions calling for cooperation with the UNFCCC, especially in sharing information. Kyoto Protocol contracting parties invited advice from Ramsar scientists in drafting policies on peatland and carbon sequestration. Further, the convention has endorsed the development of a memorandum of cooperation between the Ramsar Convention Bureau and the UNFCCC to protect the interests of small island states, threatened by climate change and encroaching wetlands.

During the tenth meeting of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands' COP, held in October, 2008, in the Republic of Korea, the Ramsar Convention entered into a new partnership with the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the Danon Group, producers of Evian bottled water. The initiative will attempt to control global warming through wetlands protection and restoration. The convention has achieved great success in educating the general public about the importance of wetlands. By January, 2008, more than seventeen hundred wetland areas, covering more than 153 million hectares, had been included on the Ramsar List, ranging in size from less than one hectare to more than 6 million hectares.

References

1. DiMento, Joseph F. C., and Pamela Doughman, eds. Climate Change: What It Means for Us, Our Children, and Our Grandchildren. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press, 2007.

2. Hunt, Constance Elizabeth. Thirsty Planet: Strategies for Sustainable Water Management. London: Zed Books, 2004.

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