Story | 28 Sep, 2018
Biodiversity monitoring in Ha Long Bay and Cat Ba Archipelago: getting started
“What species exist in this site?” is a question that is often asked by visitors to Vietnam’s protected areas. It seems to be a simple question to answer given the amount of research that’s been carried out in Vietnam’s national parks and nature reserves. But as MONRE…
Story | 14 Aug, 2018
Rethink plans to dam Mekong after Laos disaster
Barrage collapse highlights risks and need for alternative energy sources - The collapse of the Xe-Pian Xe-Namnoy dam after heavy rains last month that killed more than 30 in Laos and left thousands of Lao and Cambodian people…
Story | 05 Jul, 2018
How to increase the value of Vietnam’s forestry sector?
On a visit to Quang Tri in 2016 we asked a forest ranger where the best forest was. He said it was in remote areas too inaccessible for illegal logging or land conversion. If an area has fertile soil and is easy to access, people will turn it into farmland. When we asked a young farmer in Yen…
Story | 28 Jun, 2018
GEF Assembly beach clean-up yields nearly 1 kilo of trash per metre per minute
On Tuesday, 26 June, 300 volunteers trained by IUCN collected almost half a ton of trash – 82% of which was single-use plastics – in 30 minutes from a 500-metre stretch of beach in Da Nang, Viet Nam. The exercise coincided with the sixth Global Environment Facility (GEF) Assembly currently…
Story | 27 Jun, 2018
Tanzania urged to halt logging plans and dam project in Selous Game Reserve, as advised by IUCN
Manama, Bahrain – Tanzania has been urged to not proceed with plans to log 143,638 ha in the Selous Game Reserve today at UNESCO’s World Heritage Committee meeting, as recommended by the International Union of Conservation of Nature (IUCN). The area would be in the same location…
Story | 28 May, 2018
World Heritage in-danger: Belize reef recovers while Lake Turkana faces dam threat – IUCN
In-danger status can be lifted from the world’s second largest coral reef, Belize Barrier Reef Reserve System, according to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) in charge of advising the UNESCO World Heritage Committee on natural sites. IUCN recommends danger-listing Kenya’s…
Story | 03 Apr, 2018
Media trip focuses on tourism development on Cat Ba Island
Cat Ba is the largest of the 367 islands that make up the Cat Ba Archipelago, home of the Critically Endangered Cat Ba langur. Located near Hai Phong, Cat Ba is a national park as well as an…
Story | 05 Feb, 2018
60 year-old Sau Dung is a fisherman who lives by the Hau River, a tributary of the Mekong in Viet Nam’s Hau Giang Province. His family relies on his catch, and with his skill and hard work, he can earn VND 6 million (US$ 265) every month. But there are not many…
Story | 18 Dec, 2017
In the framework of Ha Long – Cat Ba Alliance, funded by the United State Agency for International Development (USAID), IUCN will hold a media talk with the topic “Sustainable tourism development in the Heritage Sites”, focusing on Ha Long Bay World Heritage Site and Cat Ba Archipelago. The…
Story | 21 Nov, 2017
"Beautiful, totally worth it, shame about the litter. We thoroughly enjoyed our overnight cruise in Ha Long Bay and would recommend this experience. The only detractor was seeing litter in the water in the area where we went kayaking. Apparently, it's been cleaned up a lot in recent years but it…