The government of France has designated a fascinating collection of eleven new Wetlands of International Importance. In addition to several lagoon systems along the northern and southern coasts, there are two additional lagoons along the beautiful east coast of Corsica. Perhaps most interestingly, there are also several new sites in France’s overseas territories, or outre-mer, including a coral reef system near Tahiti in French Polynesia, sites o­n Martinique and in French Guyana, and a 2.2 million hectare expanse of the southern Indian Ocean that includes the French sub-Antarctic archipelagos Crozet and Kerguelen and the Amsterdam and Saint-Paul islands. In addition, the new sites include the long-awaited “Impluvium d’Evian”, the plateau across Lake Geneva (Lac Léman) from the Ramsar Secretariat from which rainwater filters downward over twenty years to become the purified mineral waters of Evian-les-Bains, the lakeside spa centre and home of the Ramsar centre and botanical garden “Pré Curieux”. The Danone Group, owner of the Evian bottled water company, has generously supported the Ramsar Convention’s outreach efforts over the past ten years through the “Evian Initiative” and the “Ecoles de l’Eau” project.
France now has 36 Ramsar sites, covering an area of 3,315,695 hectares. Ramsar’s Assistant Advisor for Europe, Monica Zavagli, has prepared brief site descriptions for the Annotated Ramsar List.

Source: website of the Ramsar Convention

Updated on 11/19/2008 12:12:13 PM.