PMO apprised of possible delisting of Bhitarkanika from Ramsar site
Kharasrota drinking water project
Kendrapara: The state government’s bid to draw fresh water from the Kharasrota river at Barundiha under Rajkanika block in this district for a mega drinking water project in Bhadrak district might lead to delisting of Bhitarkanika wildlife sanctuary from the list of the major world wetlands in Ramsar site, a report said.
Notably, the Bhitarkanika mangroves forest was designated as a Ramsar Wetland of International Importance in 2002. The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands of International Importance is an international treaty for the conservation and sustainable use of wetlands. It’s named after the city of Ramsar in Iran where the convention was signed in 1971.
By Marian McGuinness 18 January 2021
The sunroof was open and the tinted windows were wound down. It was the closest I could get to soaking in the surrounds of desert and sea under the cloud-sailing sky.
I was on Indian Ocean Drive heading a couple of hours north of Perth to Lake Thetis, on Western Australia’s wildcard Coral Coast. Like an M C Escher drawing, the landscape morphs from market gardens to limestone-spotted scrub, soundtracked with clattering windmills drawing water from the Yarragadee Aquifer formed during the Jurassic era. There were white-trunked eucalypts and punk-haired grass trees sprouting in their thousands, flocks of black cockatoos in raucous flight and, sadly, dozens of kangaroos that had ended their days as roadkill.