cover def. 25-09-2001 14:23 Pagina 1 BirdLife in Europe In Europe, the BirdLife International Partnership works in more than 40 countries. Important Bird Areas ALBANIA and potential Ramsar Sites ANDORRA AUSTRIA BELARUS in Europe BELGIUM BULGARIA CROATIA CZECH REPUBLIC DENMARK ESTONIA FAROE ISLANDS FINLAND FRANCE GERMANY GIBRALTAR GREECE HUNGARY ICELAND IRELAND ISRAEL ITALY LATVIA LIECHTENSTEIN LITHUANIA LUXEMBOURG MACEDONIA MALTA NETHERLANDS NORWAY POLAND PORTUGAL ROMANIA RUSSIA SLOVAKIA SLOVENIA SPAIN SWEDEN SWITZERLAND TURKEY UKRAINE UK The European IBA Programme is coordinated by the European Division of BirdLife International. For further information please contact: BirdLife International, Droevendaalsesteeg 3a, PO Box 127, 6700 AC Wageningen, The Netherlands Telephone: +31 317 47 88 31, Fax: +31 317 47 88 44, Email: [email protected], Internet: www.birdlife.org.uk This report has been produced with the support of: Printed on environmentally friendly paper What is BirdLife International? BirdLife International is a Partnership of non-governmental conservation organisations with a special focus on birds. The BirdLife Partnership works together on shared priorities, policies and programmes of conservation action, exchanging skills, achievements and information, and so growing in ability, authority and influence. Each Partner represents a unique geographic area or territory (most often a country). In addition to Partners, BirdLife has Representatives and a flexible system of Working Groups (including some bird Specialist Groups shared with Wetlands International and/or the Species Survival Commission (SSC) of the World Conservation Union (IUCN)), each with specific roles and responsibilities. I What is the purpose of BirdLife International? – Mission Statement The BirdLife International Partnership strives to conserve birds, their habitats and global biodiversity, working with people towards sustainability in the use of natural resources. I Where is BirdLife International heading? – Vision Statement Birds are beautiful, inspirational and international. Birds are excellent flagships and vital environmental indicators. By focusing on birds, and the sites and habitats on which they depend, the BirdLife International Partnership is working to improve the quality of life for birds, for other wildlife (biodiversity) and for people. I Aims BirdLife’s long-term aims are to: • prevent the extinction of any bird species • maintain and where possible improve the conservation status of all bird species • conserve and where appropriate improve and enlarge sites and habitats important for birds • help, through birds, to conserve biodiversity and to improve the quality of people’s lives • integrate bird conservation into sustaining people’s livelihoods. I Guiding principles BirdLife International promotes sustainable living as a means of conserving birds, and all other life forms. BirdLife Programmes are built through a participatory process of: • linking Partners to plan policy, programmes and actions and to agree chosen priorities • using the expertise and resources of Partners in all activities as fully as possible • dividing programme tasks and responsibilities amongst the Partnership according to their wishes, expertise and capabilities • sharing skills, experience and information within the Partnership so as to develop the capacity of individual Partners • providing open access to data on birds and biodiversity to enable better informed decision-making • democratic governance by the Partners • working through local communities, organisations and individuals • integrating bird and biodiversity conservation with social and economic development. BirdLife International works with all like-minded organisations, national and local governments, decision-makers, landowners and managers, in pursuing bird and biodiversity conservation. The global work of the BirdLife Partnership is funded entirely by voluntary donations. To find out more about how you could support this work please contact BirdLife International, European Division Office, Droevendaalsesteeg 3a, PO Box 127, NL-6700 AC Wageningen, The Netherlands. Tel: + 31 (0) 317 478831; Fax: + 31 (0) 317 478844; Email: [email protected]; Internet: http://www.birdlife.org.uk Important Bird Areas and potential Ramsar Sites in Europe Principal national contributors Austria (Michael Dvorak), Belarus (Alexander Kozulin), Belgium (Wim Van den Bossche), Bulgaria (Sergey Dereliev), Croatia (Tibor Mikuska), Cyprus (Melis Charalambides), Czech Republic (David Lacina), Denmark (Knud Flensted and Henrik Skov), Estonia (Andres Kalamees), Finland (Teemu Lehtiniemi), France (Bernard Deceuninck), Germany (Christoph Sudfeldt and Daniel Doer), Gibraltar (John Cortes), Greece (Clairie Papazoglou), Greenland (David Boertman), Hungary (Balazs Szabo), Iceland (Olafur Einarsson), Ireland (Olivia Crowe and Jackie Hunt), Italy (Patrizia Rossi and Ariel Brunner), Latvia (Edmunds Racinskis), Lithuania (Liutauras Raudonikis), Luxembourg (Patric Lorgé), FYR Macedonia (Emilian Stoynov), Malta (Joe Sultana), The Netherlands (Carolien Borggreve and Eduard Osieck), Norway (Geir Rudolfsen), Poland (Maciej Gromadzki), Portugal (Luis Costa and Manuela Nuñes), Romania (Dan Munteanu and József Szabó), Russia (Sergey Bukreev), Slovakia (Pavol Kanuch), Slovenia (Leon Kebe and Luka Bozic), Spain (Carlota Viada and Juan Criado), Sweden (Björn Welander), Switzerland (Lorenz Heer), Turkey (Bahtiyar Kurt and Güven Eken), Ukraine (Oleg Dudkin) and United Kingdom (Duncan Huggett). Project manager Des Callaghan Project advisors Melanie Heath, John O’Sullivan and Dave Pritchard Part-funded by Vogelbescherming Nederland, The Royal Society for the Protection of Birds and The Ramsar Bureau Recommended citation BirdLife International (2001) Important Bird Areas and potential Ramsar Sites in Europe. BirdLife International, Wageningen, The Netherlands. © 2001 BirdLife International Wellbrook Court, Girton Road, Cambridge, CB3 0NA, United Kingdom. Tel: +44 1223 277318; Fax: +44 1223 277200; Email: [email protected]; Internet: http://www.birdlife.org.uk BirdLife International is a UK-registered charity All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, electrical, chemical, mechanical, optical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission of the publisher. First published 2001 by BirdLife International Designed and produced by Graphic Match, Veldhoven, The Netherlands Important Bird Areas and potential Ramsar Sites in Europe Preface One of the three main pillars of the Ramsar Convention on gement of appropriate wetland sites; and 3) to foster cooperation Wetlands is that "each Contracting Party shall designate suitable among Contracting Parties, the Convention’s International wetlands within its territory for inclusion in a List of Wetlands of Organisation Partners, and local stakeholders in the selection, des- International Importance", expressed in Article 2. The other two ignation, and management of Ramsar Sites. pillars are the national commitment to ensure wise use of all wet- lands in the country and to cooperate at international level, notably This new report, "Important Bird Areas and potential Ramsar Sites when wetlands extend over the territories of more than one coun- in Europe", is a most valuable contribution from one of our try, where a water system is shared by several states, and in respect International Organisation Partners, BirdLife International, of shared migratory waterbird populations. towards assisting Ramsar’s Contracting Parties throughout Europe in achieving this vision for the List. The report provides state-of- Through its evolution over the last thirty years, the Convention on the-art information on the importance of over 2000 wetland sites Wetlands has developed criteria for the designation of Wetlands of across all European countries for wetland-dependent bird species International Importance, often known as "Ramsar Sites". Given and populations, identifying from the data gathered during the the initial focus on "Wetlands of International Importance especi- European IBA programme the wetlands that appear to qualify for ally as Waterfowl Habitat", criteria based on waterbirds were most Ramsar site designation under the criteria based on bird species rapidly established and specific guidelines prepared to assist and ecological communities (criteria 2 and 4), and those specifi- Contracting Parties in taking a systematic approach to identifying cally on waterbirds (criteria 5 and 6). I am sure that the report will their priority sites for designation. provide an invaluable reference tool for the practical steps to be taken by the Contracting Parties for applying the vision for the Based on the first inventory of "Important Bird Areas in Europe", Ramsar List, as elaborated in Ramsar Handbook 7 "Strategic published in 1989 by ICBP and IWRB, these two International Framework and guidelines for the future development of the List Organisation Partners of the Convention on Wetlands were able to of Wetlands of International Importance". provide to the European Contracting Parties, meeting for their 4th Conference (COP4) in Montreux, Switzerland, a first list of sites The report also provides information on the occurrence in these that qualified for Ramsar Site designation under the two waterbird key sites of globally threatened wetland-dependent birds, at wet- criteria, relating