by Tatiana Minayeva
The meeting of the Coordinating Committee on Global Action on Peatlands (CC GAP) 22-23 April in Wageningen, was initiated to finalize the peatland related documents for Ramsar COP9 planned later this year in Uganda. The previous COP8 in Valencia had requested in Resolution VIII.17 to install this CC GAP to report on the progress in implementing the Guidelines for Global Action on Peatlands and to develop a GAP implementation plan for the near future. CC GAP represents a unique example of mutual and productive cooperation between various peatland stakeholders including IMCG and the International Peat Society (IPS), our main partner in peatlands wise use implementation.
The meeting was facilitated by the Ramsar Secretariat (Tobias Salathe) and Wetlands International (Marcel Silvius) with organizational support from Alterra (Herbert Diemont). Representatives from both organizations spent their private time and money to prepare the best possible overview of what the contracting parties to the Ramsar Convention have done and need to do for peatland conservation and wise use.
The resulting report is very comprehensive and contains well-justified and reasonable priorities. To limit the number of resolutions (cf. Resolution VIII.45) the Ramsar STRP meeting had decided to present only two resolutions for the next COP: one “reporting resolution” and another to define the priorities for the future. Therefore CC GAP refrained from preparing separate resolutions on peatlands and developed six short phrases addressing the globally most urgent peatland problems to be integrated into the “priority resolution”.
Regretfully the formulation of one of the priorities, as laid down in the draft-minutes of the meeting, is unconsidered. The wording “…URGES CPs and the international donor community to develop and implement a survival plan for tropical peat swamp forests and to support efforts to establish a multi-donor trust fund, considering the alarming rate of destruction of tropical peat swamp forests…” can be falsely understood as a plea for foreign, even violent intervention, if a country abuses its peatlands, irrespective of its causes (e.g. lack of knowledge). This issue requires more careful phrasing.
The second disappointment is that the peatland items were hardly integrated in the draft Ramsar “priority resolution”. Peatlands are only mentioned in two paragraphs of Draft Resolution 2:
- 26. In relation to attention to peatland ecosystems as another example area of the application of the wise use concept, and in the context of Ramsar’s role in the Coordinating Committee for Global Action on Peatlands (GAP), disseminate information, monitor implementation of GAP by Parties, identify gaps, and assist in fundraising for GAP implementation. [Secretariat; GAP Coordinating Committee] (STRP12)
- 27. Develop and implement a survival plan for tropical peat swamp forests. [CPs, donors] (STRP12)
So, the survival plan is in! But nothing about peatlands and water, about peat fires, about peatlands and climate change, about peatlands and biodiversity, all these other urgent priorities that CC GAP had identified. The Standing Committee has approved the draft resolutions in June and we cannot expect many changes anymore…
Now the question is: what can we do? We have used all available mechanisms to raise awareness for peatland hot spots in the Ramsar process and they all seem to fail, inspite of the extra attention for peatlands that Ramsar CoP8 requested in 2002.
One option is – in a concerted effort of IMCG and IPS - to try again and integrate peatlands into the resolution drafts. The other solution could be - if the Ramsar Bureau and Standing Committee continue to neglect the huge peatland related problems, that CC GAP reports directly to COP9 as Resolution VIII.17 requests and permits.
Soon we will expose all materials from CC GAP on the IMCG web page to enable our members to find the relevant documents more easily. You can also try www.ramsar.org. Inform yourself and support effective intervention in Ramsar decision making!