Central Asian Flyway
[1] A flyway is an operational concept linked to waterfowl whose population one wishes to manage over their entire migration space.
They are: Afghanistan, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bahrain, China, Georgia, Iran Republic of, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, Pakistan, Russian Federation, Saudi Arabia, Sri Lanka, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, Chagos Islands and Uzbekistan.
The remaining countries in the Central Asian Flyway are: Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Iraq, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, Oman, Qatar and Yemen.
This includes various international conventions including Central Asian Waterbirds Flyway Action Plan,[2] Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species (CMS), Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA), Convention on Wetlands of International Importance (Ramsar) and Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and development agencies including United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), World Bank and Asian Development Bank (ADB) and international Non-governmental organizations including BirdLife International, World Conservation Union (IUCN), World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) and Wetlands International who all cooperate on regional and national wildlife conservation.
The wetlands are home to about 70 species of resident waterbirds including ducks, grebe, cormorants, bitterns, herons, egrets, storks, rails, jacanas, finfoot, waders, gulls, turns, and skimmers.
The important threatened species are masked finfoot, Indian skimmer, black-headed ibis, greater adjutant, lesser adjutant, Baikal teal, Baer's pochard, ferruginous pochard, wood snipe, Nordmann's greenshank, and spoon-billed sandpiper.
The wetlands of Bangladesh are being degraded rapidly due to population pressure, withdrawal of water for irrigation, destruction of swamp forest, and many other anthropogenic and natural causes.
The Sundarbans mangrove forest of Bangladesh are included within 139,699 ha (539 sq mi) of 3 Wildlife sanctuaries which are part of the Sunderbans World Heritage Site.
The Ministry of Environment and Forests is the nodal agency for developing strategy and action plans and managing national, regional, and international programmes on water birds and wetlands conservation.
Current flyway management systems rely on information from local hunters, erratic wildlife surveys and raw estimates.
World Wide Fund for Nature reported that Pakistan's wetlands and their rich biological resources are threatened by over-exploitation, habitat destruction and polluted environments.
