People behind AEWA - Essam Mohamed Bouras

Bonn, 29 July 2015 - Essam first had dealings with AEWA in 2008. Although he was not the National Focal Point for the Agreement at the time, he attended the 4th Meeting of the Parties in Madagascar. The MOP presented the opportunity for Essam to meet many professionals with an active interest in birds, all sharing and exchanging information. Since that time, Essam’s connections with AEWA have grown.

“I started working on the terms and conditions of the Agreement and its action plans with my team. Our dream was to gain more knowledge and learn as much as possible about Libyan birds and share this information with others. We worked hard to achieve this dream, because when we began there was severe lack of information and limited resources concerning birds in Libya”, says Essam.  

As the years passed Essam and his team gained more experience about waterbirds, and after six years of hard work, collecting and analysing information and data, the team felt that the moment had come to take the next step – disseminating all the information they had collected to satisfy the hunger of bird specialists across the Mediterranean region.

Essam was part of a multinational team responsible for publishing the first “Atlas of Wintering Waterbirds of Libya 2005-2010", which was launched in La Rochelle, France during AEWA MOP5 in 2012. “That was one of the highlights of my career, when I stood before so many experts to present our achievement” says Essam.

Another highlight of Essam’s career was being able to confirm the nesting of Marbled Teal (Marmaronetta angustirostris), after one of his colleagues had recorded the first breeding in 2012.

Last updated on 30 July 2015