What's New @ Ramsar

WWF / Ramsar / Switzerland partnership with Malawi, Mozambique, and Tanzania

Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania announced a partnership with WWF, the Ramsar Secretariat, and the Swiss Agency for the Environment on 31 August 2002 in Johannesburg. They will be working on joint conservation of Lake Malawi/Niassa/Nyasa, as the lake is variously known, on a transboundary basis. The three countries will be supported in designating their respective parts of the lake as Ramsar sites. The project starts immediately in Tanzania, and similar support will be provided in 2003 to Malawi and Mozambique. The lake boasts up to 800 unique fish species found nowhere else in the world. The partnership illustrates the objectives of the Swiss/Ramsar/WWF policy paper that was presented in Johannesburg and will be a model for the collaborative management of transboundary rivers and lakes.

From left to right: WWF Living Waters programme director Jamie Pittock, Mozambican National Director for Environmental Protection Emidio Sebastiao, Tanzanian Minister for Natural Resources and Tourism Zakia Hamdani Meghji, Swiss Environment State Secretary Philippe Roch, and Ramsar Bureau Secretary General Delmar Blasco.
(Malawian representative absent)

Credit: © WWF-Canon / Chris MARAIS

For further information about the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, please contact the Ramsar Convention Bureau, Rue Mauverney 28, CH-1196 Gland, Switzerland (tel +41 22 999 0170, fax +41 22 999 0169, e-mail ramsar@ramsar.org). Posted 11 September 2002, Dwight Peck, Ramsar.