Tasmanian wetlands the poor cousin of our famous wilderness

Vishnu Prahalad celebrates the 50th anniversary of the often forgotten global Ramsar convention

THIS summer, we stayed home and many of us took the chance to explore Australia’s backyard with its incredible natural and cultural heritage.

The most remarkable of these areas are designated globally, under the World Heritage Convention, such as the much-loved Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area (TWWHA).

Indeed, World Heritage is a now a well-recognised term and an important brand for our tourism industry.

Perhaps less well known in the family of global conventions, is the older Ramsar Convention on Wetlands. Older because the Wetlands Convention was the first global treaty signed between nations to protect ecosystems, in February 1971, at an Iranian coastal town called Ramsar.

This multinational agreement marked a new global consciousness at the time in our understanding of the importance of the need to conserve natural and cultural heritage. In the following year, 1972, the younger brother, and more famous World Heritage Convention was born.

Now 50 years on, this is the golden jubilee of the birth of Ramsar Convention, or if you will, a new consciousness for conservation. This provides us a chance to look back on the past five decades, and forward to the next five in a crucial period for the global community to cope with the rising challenges of climate disruption and the extinction crisis, among others.

Since being one of the first nations to sign in to the Ramsar Convention, Australia led the way for global wetland conservation in many respects. The world’s first Ramsar site or Wetland of International Importance (like World Heritage Site) was in Cobourg Peninsula in Northern Territory, designated in 1974.

Tasmania played a part in this early history. We have 10

Ramsar sites, all listed as early as November 1982, and among the first 12 sites listed in Australia. We now have 66 Australian sites, as part of 2414 sites listed globally.

Among the ten Tasmanian sites, perhaps the most accessible one is right at our doorstep, by the Hobart Airport, the Pitt WaterOrielton Lagoon area.

As people fly into Hobart, the first close look they have out of their aeroplane windows is of one of our internationally recognised wetlands, and one of the oldest Ramsar sites in the world.

However, one must wonder if the fact registers among people who peep out of their windows as they begin to land in Hobart.

Even at ground level, people who are travelling along the causeway to Sorell and beyond get the unique experience of driving past this natural wonder.

Again, several decades on, it is likely we are largely oblivious of the riches around us, hiding in plain sight.

This is despite initiatives such as the annual World Wetlands Day events each year to mark the birthdate of

the Ramsar Convention.

One lesson from the past 50 years is our wetlands remain largely undervalued as part of our natural and cultural heritage relative to forests, mountains, and the occasional beach, which dominate our general perception of what nature looks like and is continuously reiterated in the advertising material for tourism in the state.

This insight offers us the potential to expand our appreciation for wetlands as part of broadening our relationship with the natural world around us.

And this remains a main objective for the future of the Ramsar Convention, to find better ways to engage the broader public and businesses in the many ecosystem functions and services of wetlands, and how they sustain our individual and collective wellbeing.

The contribution of science to this endeavour has been in increasing our understanding of wetlands, in their ability to sequester carbon and mitigate against climate disruption, their importance for sustaining wild-catch fisheries, and their role as key refuge habitats for charismatic bird species.

The role of policy makers, peak bodies, businesses, and community groups is to improve the focus on wetlands as part of our broader appreciation of Tasmania’s natural environment.

There are many steps to be taken in this journey, both behind the scenes (such as with our planning laws) and on the frontline (such as with marketing through websites, brochures, interpretation signs).

In all these efforts, what the Ramsar Convention does provide is a way to be part of global family, much as the World Heritage Convention does, in what is a critical century for humanity where conserving our natural and cultural heritage needs to be done across wetlands and forests, and importantly, at both local and global scales.