Turkmenistan has acceded to the African-Eurasian Waterbird Agreement (AEWA) bringing the number of Parties to that Agreement to 82. Turkmenistan has also acceded to the Convention becoming the 132nd Party.

In a historic decision, the use of lead gunshot in wetlands will be banned in all European Union Member States under REACH, the EU’s framework regulation for chemicals. This decision is in response to the provisions of AEWA and marks one of the greatest conservation achievements in the 25-year history of the Agreement. No other single measure implemented under AEWA to date will have had such a wide-reaching impact on the overall well-being of the migratory waterbirds AEWA was conceived to protect.

As part of the global celebration of this year’s World Migratory Bird Day (WMBD), the UNEP/AEWA Secretariat joined several national BirdLife partners in a special webinar organized by BirdLife International focussing on the East Atlantic Flyway. The East Atlantic Flyway, which extends from Arctic regions of Canada, Greenland, Iceland and the Russian Federation to the southern tip of Africa is an important migration pathway covered by the African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbird Agreement (AEWA).  

Birds can be found everywhere: in cities and in the countryside; in parks and backyards, in forests and mountains, and in wetlands and along the shores.  They connect all these habitats and they connect us, reminding us of our own connection to the planet, the environment, wildlife and each other.  Through their seasonal movements, migratory birds also remind us of nature’s cycles.