Whose mangroves are they anyway?
I have been busy recently with setting up our Australian mangrove-saltmarsh network – at least to formalise it with a new website. Please pass this message around to ask if anyone would like to check it out, and maybe also to register if they want to stay in touch with things going on in Australia. Or they could just revisit the site whenever.
Gaston Browne: Don't let Chinese Developers break laws conserving our Marine Protected Areas.
I am contacting you because of your prior interest in tidal wetlands, mangroves and or saltmarsh habitats around Australia.
This message flags the launch of our first website for the Australian Mangrove & Saltmarsh Network (AMSN). The site is generously supported by Dr Damien Burrows, Director of TropWATER, and James Cook University. The url is: www.amsn.net.au. Please check it out soon.
Note that, while our network is informal, it is active and growing fast. To keep things so, we rely on individual contributions and donations from our special stakeholders. This years meeting was well attended in Wollongong. It was led by Dr Kerrylee Rogers, and hosted by UoW along with support from TNC and the NSW Dept. Environment & Heritage.
If you are interested in continuing your interest and involvement in the network, please register using the website portal. It is free! Being registered will guarantee you will get the latest news and updates from AMSN members, the best methods for habitat assessment & evaluation, the best ways to restore damaged sites, and early news about AMSN meetings. And, there is a lot more likely ... the network is as good as its memberS.
For example, as a result of the Wollongong meeting, a position paper is in preparation about national policy issues regards mangrove habitat in Australia. This professional view is much needed to emphasis further that while tidal wetlands are profoundly beneficial, they are also seriously threatened. At best, these shoreline habitats face an uncertain future.
For those who can make it to the next annual meeting, I hope to see you in Darwin next year.
This is Toe Aung @ Myanmar.
It is very delighted to inform you that I have been selected by the Fulbright Scholarship Program. Without your contribution, I would not have achieved this scholar. I also understand one of the strong points in my application was with the invitation letter from you. Thank you very much for your support.I will try the best to complete my program under your guidance and supervision.
For your reference, please kindly find attached my proposed theme in the application that was basically prepared by following your fields of research. In this regard, please let me know if there are anything I should prepare from my country in advance.
Since now, I may receive a couple of questions from the Fulbright program regarding my accommodation at your institution. So, let me get back to you with some points they would like to know, particularly the possible time frame and condition of office space you can provide for me.
Again, thank you very much for your support. I also never forget Jim Enright and Robin Lewis who did great efforts to introduce me with you all. Then, I will write a separated letter to them for special thanks.
I look forward to working together with you soon for mangroves as well as water.
An international environmental organisation has given its backing to a growing protest in Antigua against a massive development on its environmentally protected North shore. The announcement came on the same day as the Antigua Conversation Society launched a petition which gained more than 800 signatures in the first 24 hours.
The Mangrove Action Project, which is a global network focusing on viable, long term solutions to halt and prevent mangrove destruction, says that it is deeply concerned by the plans published by Chinese development corporation YIDA. YIDA has purchased the 1600 acres of land, including mangrove-rich Guiana Island, with the intention of developing the US$1billion Singulari resort. The resort will feature hundreds of villas, several marinas, luxury hotels, a casino, school and two golf courses.
The area is in the 3,100 hectare North East Marine Management Area (NEMMA). In order to be carried out legally the project needs an Environmental Impact Assessment being submitted under the Physical Planning Act 2003. There is also a requirement for permission to be sought from the Fisheries Division under the Fisheries Act 2006 for any pruning or removal of mangroves, which must improve the environment.
Species which make their homes in the NEMMA include many of the 182 species of Antiguan and Barbudan birds such as the endangered West Indian Whistling Duck, the Lesser Antillean Flycatcher and Bullfinch, egrets, and Carib doves. There are also Hawksbill turtles which nest on the beaches, snapper and many other fish, lobsters, coral, sponges, conch, and seagrass as well as the ecologically vital mangroves. In 2005, the NEMMA was declared a marine protected area under the Fisheries (Marine Reserve Area) Notice No 36.
Alarm about the development is spreading in Antigua, with the Antigua Conservation Society launching an online petition yesterday (12th May) asking Prime Minister Gaston Browne not to let Chinese developers break the laws which conserve Antigua’s marine protected areas. The petition gathered a massive total of more than 800 signatures in the first 24 hours.
The group says it believes while the majority of Antiguans support economic growth, jobs and development in the country, they don’t want it at the expense of the island’s precious environment. Director of Adventure Antigua Eco Tours and founder of the Antigua Conservation Society, Eli Fuller, said: "The Siboney were the first humans settling here in Antigua and Barbuda.
They lived in the shadows of our coastal vegetation some 4000 years ago and were sustained by the ecosystems that were rooted there among the mangroves. Tourism has been in these islands only since the 1950s, and already we have removed much of the same vegetation that sustained life here until its arrival. Only time will tell how long tourism will continue to be an integral part of our lives here in Antigua and Barbuda. It's a very fickle industry to rely upon with so many threats from so many angles that could make tourism a distant memory of the past...... just like the Siboney.
What will happen when tourism is no longer able to provide food for our nation? It is then that we will need to rely more heavily than ever before on the natural resources and of course this will be impossible if they continue to destroy them. It's time for the words sustainable development to become more than words." Amongst those protesting the development is Antiguan-born Ziffy Tyrrell who said: “People are really alarmed at these plans and the bullying tone of some of the speeches made in regard to them, calling those of us concerned about the environment a ‘minority’.