News from the CEPA e-mail list

Translation and publication of Ramsar guidance (30/03/04)

Good morning everyone:

Thank you to Hastings Maloya, Charmalee Jayasinghe, Meena Raghunathan and Raquibul Amin for the discussion on translating and "personalising" Ramsar materials for local use. I have to agree with Meena that it is especially useful to edit the original texts so that they have some local relevance, as well as translating the text into a local language. We encourage this not just in reproducing our more technical publications - such as the river basin guidelines that I highlighted in the e-mail that has generated this discussion - but also some of the materials that we produce as part of of our World Wetlands Day (WWD) package each year (such as our posters, Wetland values and functions fact sheets (in 2002) and cultural heritage fact sheets (in 2003), etc).

Unfiortunately it is not possible to be prescriptive in suggesting funding sources. Some of our contacts have been successful in raising funds for such purposes from embassies (the Netherlands and British Embassies have proved supportive in some parts of the world but I'm sure there are others too) but they have also used a diversity of other sources of funding.

Meena also raises an important issue - finding some kind of local forum/network so that people can begin to collaborate and pool expertise and resources. For WWD activities and publications we have found recently that NGOs and our Ramsar Administrative Authorities have begun to collaborate in various parts of the world and we have tried, again associated with WWD, to put people in touch with each other within a country when they have written asking for materials in the hope that they will collaborate.

On a broader scale, our Ramsar CEPA Resolution (available here http://www.ramsar.org/outreach_index.htm) does strongly encourage the development of regional/national/action plans to coordinate wetland CEPA activities and suggests development of a task force within a country that would include government officials as well as NGOs with communication as well as technical expertise to drive this process. It goes almost without saying that a major stumbling block is the financial resources to make this a reality in many countries. Just for your information, we do have a list on our Web site of the official Ramsar CEPA Focal Points that have been designated by their countries to take a leading role in the CEPA programme (http://ramsar.org/key_nfp_cepa.htm ). Almost all of them are members of this e-list or the CEPA e-lists in Spanish and French.

If CEC, on a regional basis, (or any other institution or network) were able to help in organising workshops to make this kind of development a reality - or even at a less ambitious level to help identify useful communications materials and coordinate their development at a regional level - this would be a great support for wetland conservaton.

Best wishes, Sandra Hails, Ramsar Secretariat

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-----Original Message-----
From: Raquibul Amin [mailto:raquib@iucnbd.org]
Sent: 31 March 2004 02:15
To: ramsar-cepa-eng@indaba.iucn.org;
Subject: Re: [Ramsar-CEPA-Eng] Translation and publication of Ramsar guidance

I fully agree with Meena. Simple translation will not be enough to meet the local need. The translated guideline needs to be complemented with case studies and success stories from the country and perhaps from the region. Discussion at the regional level is required to suit the
communication package for the countries in this region.

Raquibul Amin
Manager, Programme Development
IUCN Bangladesh Country Office
House-11, Road-138,
Gulshan-1, Dhaka-1212, Bangladesh.
E-mail: raquib@iucnbd.org

-----Original Message-----
From: Meena Raghunathan <meena.raghunathan@ceeindia.org
To: ramsar-cepa-eng@indaba.iucn.org
Date: Tue, 30 Mar 2004 09:52:30 +0530
Subject: Re: [Ramsar-CEPA-Eng] Translation and publication of Ramsar
guidance

Local language versions are absolutely essential. Of course, we are not talking just translations here--we do need to have local examples, data and case studies. What might be very nice is to have like sub-regional workshops, to discuss how to really effectively target
and tailor make the information, and then work together in taking this forward. This could involve both wetland experts and communication people--a network that readily comes to mind is the IUCN-Commission on Educaiton and Communication, which is also organized sub-regionally and regionally.

There are obviously many areas of collaboration--Sri Lanka-India on Tamil; Bangladesh-India on Bangla language, etc.

Meena Raghunathan
Centre for Environment Education, India
and Vice Chair, South Asia, IUCN-CEC

----- Original Message -----
From: "Charmalee Jayasinghe" <cdj@iucnsl.org
To: <ramsar-cepa-eng@indaba.iucn.org
Sent: Tuesday, March 30, 2004 8:59 AM
Subject: Re: [Ramsar-CEPA-Eng] Translation and publication of Ramsar guidance

I think that's a great idea. Would it possible to source some funds to translate and print the documents into the local languages in Sri Lanka, too? ( Sinhala and tamil languages).

There is a great demand for wetland publications in local language particularly from local NGOs, university students and local government officers. As tamil is also spoken in parts of India the publications can be used in India too.

Best Regards, Charmalee

Charmalee Jayasinghe
Head, Education and Communications
IUCN - The World Conservation Union
Sri Lanka Country Office
53, Horton Place, Colombo 7, Sri Lanka
website: www.iucnsl.org

----- Original Message -----
From: "Hastings Maloya (MMCT)" <hastings@mountmulanje.org.mw
To: <ramsar-cepa-eng@indaba.iucn.org
Sent: Friday, January 01, 1904 9:32 AM
Subject: Re: [Ramsar-CEPA-Eng] Translation and publication of Ramsar guidance

This is encouraging! Is it possible to get such financial assistance to have these documents translated to some African languages? I would believe that if people, for example, in Malawi had these resources available in local languages, it could be of much help in conservation and wise use of wetlands. What do others think?

****************
Hastings Maloya
Programme Officer
Environmental Education and Communication
Mulanje Mountain Conservation Trust (MMCT)
P.O. Box 139, Mulanje MALAWI
E-mail: hastings@mountmulanje.org.mw
Website: http://www.mountmulanje.org.mw
---

on 9/3/04 12:08, HAILS Sandra - Ramsar at hails@ramsar.org wrote:

Good morning everyone:

Here's an item from our "What's New" section of the Web that exemplifies implementation of operative paragraph 33 of the CEPA Resolution (VIII.31) which "URGES those Parties with other national and local languages different from the three official languages of the Convention to consider translating key Ramsar guidance and guidelines into those languages in order to make them more widely available".

The "Guidelines for integrating wetland conservation and wise use into river basin management", (Resolution VII.18 adopted at COP7 in 1999) were published in 2000, with case studies and other illustrative material, as Handbook 4 in the Ramsar Toolkit. Now the Global Environment Centre has prepared a suite of new versions of Handbook 4 to meet the needs of the Southeast Asian region. With financial support from the ASEAN Regional Centre for Biodiversity Conservation, GEC has produced language versions in English, Indonesian, Malay, Thai, and Vietnamese, with 13 new case studies from Southeast Asia, and is making these available as a 36-page softcover brochure and in PDF format both on CD-ROM and downloadable from the "RBI Portal". More information from GEC's Oi May here http://www.ramsar.org/forum_riverbasin_seasia.htm .

Best wishes, Sandra Hails, Ramsar Secretariat

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Sandra Hails, CEPA Programme Officer
Ramsar Convention Secretariat
Rue Mauverney 28, CH-1196 Gland, Switzerland
Tel: +41 22 999 0176; Fax: +41 22 999 0169
E-mail: hails@ramsar.org
Web Site: http://ramsar.org
CEPA mini-Web site: http://ramsar.org/outreach_index.htm

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