Nature Iraq, key biodiversity survey of Kurdistan

Auteurs : | |

Éditeur : KBA-Kurdistan	Date & Lieu : 2008-01-01, New York
Préface :	Pages : 120
Traduction :	ISBN :
Langue : Anglais	Format : 216x228 mm
Code FIKP : Liv. En. 4761	Thème : Général

Présentation	Table des Matières	Introduction	Identité	PDF
Nature Iraq, key biodiversity survey of Kurdistan Korsh Ararat, Ibrahem M. Abid, Saman Abdul Rahman KBA-Kurdistan This document presents field observations from the Key Biodiversity Areas (KBA) Survey conducted in January and February 2008 & May and June 2008, in the three northern governorates of Iraq: Sulaimani, Erbil and Duhok. This survey is a joint effort of Nature Iraq (NI), the Iraqi Ministry of Environment (MoE), and other partners including the Kurdish Ministry of Environment (KMoE), the Environmental Police, a division of the Pesh Merga, as well as the University of Sulaimani (UofS).The winter and summer 2008 survey represent the third and fourth seasonal surveys conducted in Kurdistan, Northern Iraq since the start of the project in February 2007. The field effort focused on the following surveys: bird, fish, botany, water quality physical parameters, phytoplankton, zooplankton and benthic macro invertebrates. This site review provides the basic findings of the species surveys (birds, fish, and botany) at each site to assist in the determination of whether the site meets KBA criteria. .....

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The contents of this report are derived from work conducted in 2008. The Program would not have been possible without the key partnership arrangements and personal commitments of colleagues at Nature Iraq (Dr. Azzam Alwash and Anna Bachmann), Minister Narmin Othman (Iraqi Ministry of Environment), and at BirdLife International in the United Kingdom (Mr. R. F. Porter), in Jordan (Mr. Sharif Jbour) and their national partner organizations in Syria (the Syrian Society for the Conservation of Wildlife), Jordan (the Royal Society for Conservation of Nature) and also to Mauro Randone (Medingegneria Ltd. for the Italian Ministry of Environment, Land and Sea).

This program was initially supported by the Canadian International Development Agency from 2004-2006. From 2006 to the present, generous support has been provided by the Italian Ministry of Environment, Land and Sea.

KBA Team The Key Biodiversity Areas (KBA) team mainly consisted of staff from Nature Iraq (NI) and the Iraqi Ministry of Environment (MoE):

Vascular Plants / Macrophytes ― Saman Abdul Rahman (UofS), S. M. Muzher (NI), Adnan Ali Mer Jamsher (KMoE) & Nora Jamel.

Fish - Haider Ibrahim (MoE), Ibrahim M. Abid (NI), & Muhammed Saed Muhammed Noori (KMoE).

Birds ― Korsh Ararat (NI), Laeth Ali Abed (trainee) & Omar Fadhil.

In addition, Hawar Bawary (Dohuk Environmental Police) has been extremely helpful to the team in the Dohuk Governorate and advised the team on logistical and safety issues throughout the governorate but particularly on the contentious border with Turkey. The same is true for Officer Jwamer and the Forestry Police in Darbandikhan. Additional local partners have assisted the project logistically and with information about the survey sites. These have included the many guides, herders, fisherman and hunters who have helped the team and we include them in our thanks.

Introduction

This document presents field observations from the Key Biodiversity Areas (KBA) Survey conducted in January and February 2008 & May and June 2008, in the three northern governorates of Iraq: Sulaimani, Erbil and Duhok. This survey is a joint effort of Nature Iraq (NI), the Iraqi Ministry of Environment (MoE), and other partners including the Kurdish Ministry of Environment (KMoE), the Environmental Police, a division of the Pesh Merga, as well as the University of Sulaimani (UofS). The winter and summer 2008 survey represent the third and fourth seasonal surveys conducted in Kurdistan, Northern Iraq since the start of the project in February 2007. The field effort focused on the following surveys: bird, fish, botany, water quality physical parameters, phytoplankton, zooplankton and benthic macro invertebrates. This site review provides the basic findings of the species surveys (birds, fish, and botany) at each site to assist in the determination of whether the site meets KBA criteria.

KBAs are sites that are large enough or sufficiently interconnected to support viable populations of the species to which they are important. The KBA selection process uses four criteria based on the presence of four categories of species for which site-scale conservation is appropriate:

1. Globally threatened species;
2. Assemblage of restricted-range species;
3. Congregations of species that concentrate in large numbers at particular sites during some stage in their life cycle.
4. Assemblages of biome-restricted assemblages.

The KBA process is part of a large international effort to help in the establishment and prioritization of sites that are of global, regional and/or national importance. All sites are worthy of protection but conservation funds are limited and it is important to identify unique sites in Kurdistan-Iraq that are at risk of being lost or irreversibly damaged. The environment in Iraq has, after decades of war and civil strife, faced massive changes and degradation. Kurdistan-Iraq faced the destruction of thousands of its villages, chemical bombings and massive upheaval and migration of its population during the Anfal campaign of the previous Iraqi regime. Though the societal damage has been documented little has been done to examine the effects of these issues on the local environment. Underlying problems have also existed in the region for many decades if not several thousand years such as the extensive deforestation and overgrazing that has deforested many areas in Iraqi Kurdistan and continues to threaten the forests there today.
.....