IUCN, the official advisor on nature to the UNESCO World Heritage Committee, recommends adding four natural sites to the List of World Heritage in Danger: the Great Barrier Reef in Australia, the W-Arly-Pendjari Complex in Benin, Burkina Faso and Niger, the Natural and Cultural Heritage of the Ohrid region in Albania and North Macedonia, and the Volcanoes of Kamchatka in Russia. IUCN also recommends deleting the Selous Game Reserve in Tanzania from the World Heritage List, due to irreversible damage following construction of the Julius Nyerere Hydropower Project.
Now is the time to rebuild what we have lost. The restoration of our scarred land and seascapes intrinsically connects us to a chance at a healthier future and sets the stage for a nature-based recovery. Today, the symbolic launch of the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration ignites us to action. IUCN hears the call. Emboldened by the strength of our Union, we were early advocates for the Decade, building on efforts like the Bonn Challenge, the Nature-based Recovery Initiative, and the Agriculture and Land Health Initiative.
IUCN, the official advisor on nature to UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee, recommends two new inscriptions on the prestigious World Heritage List for sites in Georgia and Japan. Both places harbour a rich diversity of plant and animal species, many of which cannot be found anywhere else on Earth.
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