Naga
- The *ICLARM Quarterly
Vol.
24, No. 3 & 4 (July – December 2001)
Features
Management
of Wetland Resources in the Lower Mekong Basin:
Issues and Future Directions
M.Torell, A.M. Salamanca
and M. Ahmed
Abstract
The Lower Mekong Basin has extensive wetlands
and these are being threatened by numerous problems.
Most of these problems are interdependent and
interact with one another. The lack of an appropriate
definition of wetlands applicable to the region,
pervasive inefficiencies and chronic lack of funds
among riparian governments, and the poor appreciation
of the true economic importance of wetlands and
its resources are among the most prominent. The
current definition, based on the Convention on
Wetlands (Ramsar, Iran, 1971), is too broad when
compared to the “common” understanding of wetlands
as being swamps, marshes and the like, and was
developed specifically for wetlands with international
importance as waterfowl habitats. Furthermore,
wetlands are composed of different types of resources,
which require different modes of management. Often,
institutional competition, overlapping mandates
and sometimes jealousies occur between government
departments when they try to assert their authority
on a particular wetland resource and use, and
put forward their development plans without considering
how these may conflict with other wetlands uses.
Finally, effective wetland management requires
reliable statistics or information on rate of
harvest of natural resources such as fish and
others, fishing/harvesting methods over time in
order to determine the level of exploitation,
and the status of the natural resources. This
information is needed to identify opportunities
for expansion, to establish historical trends,
and to determine when management interventions
are necessary to protect the resources from being
overused by other developments. In order to address
these issues, *ICLARM – The World Fish Center
has launched a project, the aim of objectives
of which are described in this paper.
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