INTERNATIONAL MIRE NEWSLETTER CONSERVATION GROUP issue 2011/2-3, December 2011 The International Mire Conservation Group (IMCG) is an international network of specialists having a particular interest in mire and peatland conservation. The network encompasses a wide spectrum of expertise and interests, from research scientists to consultants, government agency specialists to peatland site managers. It operates largely through e-mail and newsletters, and holds regular workshops and symposia. For more information: consult the IMCG Website: http://www.imcg.net IMCG has a Main Board of currently 15 people from various parts of the world that has to take decisions between congresses. Of these 15 an elected 5 constitute the IMCG Executive Committee that handles day-to-day affairs. The Executive Committee consists of a Chairman (Piet-Louis Grundling), a Secretary General (Hans Joosten), a Treasurer (Francis Müller), and 2 additional members (Ab Grootjans, Rodolfo Iturraspe). Fred Ellery, Seppo Eurola, Lebrecht Jeschke, Richard Lindsay, Viktor Masing (†), Rauno Ruuhijärvi, Hugo Sjörs (†), Michael Steiner, Michael Succow and Tatiana Yurkovskaya have been awarded honorary membership of IMCG. Editorial This double Newsletter compensates somewhat for the delay in producing a Newsletter in September. So many things are happening in global mire conservation that we did not manage to compile the reports you send us and to summarize our own involvements in time. We hope to behave better in 2012. 2011 was again a year with a rising profile for peatlands. Several European countries finished national inventories and strategies (we publish here some summaries for your inspiration). And although progress seems not to be fast enough, we reached some breakthroughs on the global front in the Climate Convention that will require more work from us on the national level in 2012. Also the genus Sphagnum featured globally in 2011: with new species described from the Subantarctics, a new worldwide overview, and an international workshop on Sphagnum farming in Canada. Read about all this and other news in this Newsletter. On an IMCG organisational level, we must start thinking about the 2012 events in the Andes. Our South American friends are still sorting out schedule, itinerary and costs. We hope to provide final outcomes in January. Meanwhile you can start thinking about issues to discuss at the General Assembly, compiling resolutions and considering whether the time is ripe for YOU to candidate for the IMCG Main Board for the next two years. Michael Trepel is refreshing the IMCG website and has introduced a dynamic news site where we can provide more up-to-date information than the Newsletter is able to do. So keep an eye on it and send in news that you want to spread. We plan to produce the next Newsletter at the end of March 2012, so please send in your contributions before March 21st. For information, address changes or other things, contact us at the IMCG Secretariat. John Couwenberg & Hans Joosten, The IMCG Secretariat Institute of Botany and Landscape Ecology, Grimmerstr. 88, D-17487 Greifswald (Germany) fax: +49 3834 864114; e-mail: [email protected] Contents: Editorial ........................................................................................................................................................................ 1 A note from the Chair ................................................................................................................................................... 2 IMCG Field Symposium, Congress and General Assembly 2012 in the Andes...........................................................3 Recent achievements on the peatland/climate front...................................................................................................... 4 New IPCC Guidelines for peatland rewetting in preparation...................................................................................... 10 A new peatland standard for the voluntary carbon market: Peatland Rewetting and Conservation (VCS-PRC) ...... 12 European Habitats Forum ........................................................................................................................................... 14 Field guide IMCG 2010 field symposium in Slovakia and Poland online soon. ........................................................ 15 Finland’s Strategy for Mires and Peatlands a Step Backwards................................................................................... 16 UK Commission of Inquiry on Peatlands: Summary of findings ............................................................................... 19 Realising the Benefits of Peatlands: Overcoming policy barriers to peatland restoration .......................................... 23 BOGLAND: Sustainable management of peatlands in Ireland................................................................................... 30 Estonian mire inventory.............................................................................................................................................. 37 Three species of Sphagnum endemic to Île Amsterdam, Terres australes et Antarctiques françaises ....................... 41 Sphagnum farming workshop in the Canadian Maritimes: international research efforts and challenges................. 42 Mire conservation and the Ramsar Convention.......................................................................................................... 45 Studying peatland profiles: Mires and Peat publishes global protocol ....................................................................... 46 Regional News............................................................................................................................................................ 47 New and recent Journals/Newsletters/Books/Reports/Websites................................................................................. 57 IMCG Main Board...................................................................................................................................................... 61 UPCOMING EVENTS............................................................................................................................................... 62 _____________________ The IMCG bank acount : IBAN Number : FR76 4255 9000 8341 0200 1467 743; Bic Number (=swift) : CCOPFRPPXXX; Name : IMCG; Beçanson (France) ISSN 1682-1653 2 IMCG NEWSLETTER A note from the Chair Dear fellow members Convention talks (Hans Joosten is giving us a first hand account of the events at CoP17 held in Durban, Summer is in the air in the Southern Hemisphere and South Africa in November/December 2011. Various our colleagues in the North are feeling the bite of countries are dealing on a strategic level with mires: winter – time has certainly moved on. Perhaps a good some realising the natural benefits of peatlands (such time to stand back and asses if we (the IMCG) in the as Scotland), and others taking a step backwards and forefront of mire and peatland conservation, will be exploiting these miracles of nature more than before achieving the goals we have set, not only for the (such as Finland). Interesting developments are IMCG as an organization, but also for ourselves. Our taking place in my own country: Justice for peatlands organization is only as strong and as successful as its at last! members are – our individual achievements contribute to the success of the IMCG. The South African minister of Department of Environmental Affairs signed a notice during CoP17 We as IMCG Executive Committee (EC) did not instructing all peat extraction activities to cease at the always achieve the goals we had set for ourselves, Gerhardminnebron peatland. The extraction company with delays in producing the Newsletters and in brought an urgent appeal early in December 2011 to membership administration. National and global have the minister’s instruction set aside but the court urgencies increasingly burden our individual ruled that extraction has to stop and the matter can be workloads and adjustments are always lagging behind relooked at in 2012. I hope we can report in 2012 the the challenges. Therefore we have started to have closure of the remaining peat extraction operation in regular EC meetings on Skype. Some of the South Africa. outcomes of our first EC Skype meeting are that Ab Grootjans will from now on assist Hans Joosten and Two peat extraction companies are facing possible John Couwenberg in editing and compiling the criminal charges for apparently extracting peat in newsletter, that the Greifswald secretariat is going to portions of the Gerhardminnebron peatland without expand with Susanne Abel to reorganize and improve water use licences and for, it is alleged, not membership administration, and that the Field rehabilitating the excavated areas. On the other scale Symposium, Congress and General Assembly of incompetence we have seen officials from planned for 2012 in South America is foreseen to go environmental departments preventing landowners to ahead as planned. We have given the organizers in stop underground peat fires because the land owners consideration to schedule the meetings in the first should first do an impact assessment....?? weeks of September. Full details will – we hope - be available at the end of January 2012. We will keep Changing perceptions do not happen overnight and you informed! policies takes even longer. We say in Afrikaans, my home language: ‘Eendrag maak mag’ –