Urgent Conservation Request from South Korea

Critical Habitat for Spoon-billed Sandpiper and Nordmann's (Spotted) Greenshank Threatened

11 May 2001

UPDATE: 27 May 2001 - BAD NEWS: Thank you for the support mails over the past two weeks, but we regret to inform you that the government of South Korea, despite enormous national opposition, announced late Friday that it will continue with the reclamation of Saemankeum, the most important known shorebird site in the Yellow Sea.

Opposition will continue.

All the best,
Nial Moores and Kim Su-Kyung
Birds Korea
Latest Korea Bird News

Nial Moores pleads for your help:

Best Chance to Help Stop the World’s Largest Ongoing Tidal-Flat Reclamation Project: Saemankeum, The World’s Top Site For Spoon-billed Sandpiper and Nordmann’s Greenshank.

Two years ago, with your help, South Korean environmentalists conducted a highly successful international e-mail campaign that helped delay the ongoing Saemankeum (pronounced “Say-Man-Gum”) Reclamation project. The 40 100 ha Saemankeum Reclamation on the west coast of Korea calls for the construction of a 33km long seawall (presently 59% complete), converting 30 000 ha of tidal-flats and 10 000 ha of shallows into rice-fields and reservoirs. This makes it the largest such project in the world. In size it is equivalent to 10 Japanese Isahaya Bay Reclamation projects, or to blocking off most of the Wash in the UK.

The Saemankeum project, part of a national reclamation Master Plan calling for conversion of at least 70% of all remaining estuary and tidal-flat nationwide, was initiated in 1991 without genuine environmental impact assessment or debate.

However, in the interim, South Korean environmental awareness has been growing rapidly, as has peoples’ understanding of the negative impacts of reclamation.

Following growing protests (including the last e-mail campaign), the government has suspended the project for over a year, while it tries to work out ways to assess the possible impacts of damming two adjacent estuaries, and converting their 40 000 ha of intertidal wetlands into rice-fields.

Now, in May 2001, after months of conflicting signals, the South Korean government finally appears poised to make a decision on whether to restart the project, or to cancel it once and for all.

The decision is a politically difficult one for the incumbent government. Opinion within South Korea is both passionate and divided. Huge sums of money have already been invested in it, and those in power within the local region want it continued for the jobs the construction supports. However, a growing number of the public, all major environmental groups and both the Ministries of Environment and the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries are strongly opposed to the reclamation, on the grounds that the existing tidal-flats are critically important for biodiversity and fisheries, while the reclamation will create enormous pollution problems, and degrade a significant part of the broader Yellow Sea environment. For those interested in wetland and bird conservation both within and outside of Korea, Saemankeum is a critical but clear case. Both government and independent research confirm that the existing tidal-flats are the most important shorebird (wader) habitat in the nation. Saemankeum is for example the best place worldwide for the fast-declining and probably critically endangered Spoon-billed Sandpiper Eurynorhynchus pygmeus, with peaks of 200 individuals in recent autumns representing possibly 5-10% of the remaining world population. A single group of 60 Nordmann’s Greenshanks Tringa guttifer seen in 1998, out of less than 1 000 worldwide, also constitutes the highest count globally in recent years. Other top bird species include peaks of 60 000 Great Knot Calidris tenuirostris (out of a world population of less than 350 000), 40 000 Dunlin Calidris alpina articola (believed largely Alaskan breeders), and internationally important concentrations of other globally threatened species such as Saunders’s Gull Larus saundersi (ca 700 at maximum, or 10% of the world’s population), Black-faced spoonbill Platelea minor and Chinese Egret Egretta eulophotes.

Probably some 30 species of waterbird in total are supported by the site in concentrations recognized by the Ramsar Convention as “internationally important” and many of these are Species of Global Special Conservation Concern.

Beyond the immediate impacts of this reclamation in itself, the project’s continuance would signal clearly that South Korea values reclamation over conservation. It would significantly undermine efforts being made by the relevant ministries to conserve intertidal wetlands and their natural resources, and to honor national obligations under both the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Ramsar Convention. As a result, other projects in progress or being considered (which could claim a further 50% or more of remaining tidal-flats nationwide) would become substantially more difficult to cancel.

In addition continuing the Saemankeum Reclamation would send a clear signal of support for reclamation in neighboring countries Japan, North Korea and China, each of which have also been undertaking extensive reclamation projects contributing to the degradation of the Yellow Sea eco-region.

In sharp contrast, however, the cancellation of the Saemankeum project now would be a major force for change not only within South Korea but throughout region, enabling substantial policy changes leading towards long-term conservation of the Yellow Sea’s charismatic but threatened wildlife.

With a government announcement on the project to be made in the coming two weeks (believed on or around May 23), now really is the best chance to show support for those in government and society who are opposing this most destructive of reclamation projects.

With many thanks in advance,

Nial Moores
International Liaison
Wetlands and Birds Korea (The Korean organization dedicated to wetland and bird conservation through cooperation, research and education: Korean partners to the WWF-Japan and Wetlands International China Program Yellow Sea Ecoregion Initiative.)

In cooperation with Nam Ho Gun, Green Korea United (Committed to building and maintaining an ecologically sound and sustainable Korean peninsula and world)

Please give 10 minutes of your time to help stop this reclamation project: 5 minutes to forward this message to your friends, colleagues and to relevant list-servers or newsgroups, and a further 5 minutes to send a mail of support for NGOs and the Ministries of Environment and of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, who are responsible for wetland conservation in South Korea. Personal messages are best, but to save time, please feel free to simply cut and paste the message below:

To all those it may concern,

We would respectfully like to add our voices to those of Korean NGOs and of the Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, in asking for the cancellation of the Saemankeum Reclamation project. We understand the extreme international importance for biodiversity of the Saemankeum area (comprising both the Mankyeung and Tongjin estuaries), and will follow with interest all efforts being made by your government to conserve the area.

Yours respectfully,

Name If applicable, organisation.

And send to: wetlandfriends@hotmail.com

We will then pass on your messages to the relevant government ministries, media (if appropriate) and our home-pages.

For further information on Saemankeum in English please refer to the Birds Korea homepage.

and in Korean:

Green Korea United’s home-page at http://www.greenkorea.org

Here is an excerpt from a letter written by Mark Barter, a leading expert on the shorebirds of Asia:

During the last six years I have spent much time surveying for shorebirds in the coastal areas of the Yellow Sea. The data that have been collected by myself and others clearly show that:

(1) the intertidal flats of the Yellow Sea are critically important for many species of shorebird during their annual migrations.

(2) the Saemankeum area is the single most important area within the Yellow Sea for shorebirds.

The count data show that Saemankeum supports:

(1) at least 15 species of shorebird in internationally important numbers.

(2) more than 10% of the flyway populations of five species (Lesser Sand Plover, Great Knot, Kentish Plover, Black-tailed Godwit and Dunlin).

(3) more than >5% of the world populations of the endangered Spotted Greenshank and vulnerable Spoon-billed Sandpiper

(4) the highest recorded numbers in the WHOLE Yellow Sea on northward migration of five species (Dunlin, Terek Sandpiper, Great Knot, Lesser Sand Plover and the vulnerable Spoon-billed Sandpiper) and on southward migration of seven species (Black-tailed Godwit, Bar-tailed Godwit, Great Knot, Dunlin, Grey Plover, Kentish Plover, Lesser Sand Plover and the vulnerable Spoon-billed Sandpiper).

These statistics clearly demonstrate the extreme importance of the Saemankeum area for migratory shorebirds and the reason why so many organisations and people, both within South Korea and from outside, are pleading for the project to be cancelled.