UNESCO chooses two new Biosphere Reserves in Spain

UNESCO chooses two new Biosphere Reserves in Spain
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By m.p. - May 26, 2009 - 3:44 PM
The island of Fuerteventura and an area covering 11 municipalities in Portugal and Spain

Part of the new Gerês-Xurés reserve. Photo - Unesco

UNESCO’s international conservation programme, Man and the Biosphere, has added two sites in Spain to its World Network of Biosphere Reserves. They are amongst 22 sites from 17 countries which the programme’s International Coordinating Council decided to add to the list at a meeting in Korea this week. The decision brings the number of Biosphere Reserves up to 553 across 107 countries. It also means there are now 40 in Spain.

The new reserve on the island of Fuenteventura in the Canary Islands encompasses the entire island and part of its offshore waters. UNESCO describes it as a wide range of ecosystems with a rich diversity of marine species, with sustainable ecotourism being the main focus of the island’s population. Fuerteventura is also noted for investment in increasing its renewable energy capacity and as a model for implementing the EU’s directive on renewable energy.

The other area chosen in Spain, the Gerês-Xurés reserve, covers almost 260,000 hectares of territory in Spain and Portugal. It’s a mountainous area between north eastern Portugal and the south east of Orense in Galicia, and is already protected in both countries. The population on each side of the border shares a similar way of life, and UNESCO’s aim in naming it a Biosphere Reserve is for both countries, and their local communities, to benefit from each other’s experience under a joint management plan for sustainable management of the area’s ecosystems.

(environment story)

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