June 14, 2025 07:53 am (IST)
Follow us:
facebook-white sharing button
twitter-white sharing button
instagram-white sharing button
youtube-white sharing button
Top Iranian leaders killed in Israeli missile strikes | Israel launches fresh missile attacks on Iran after targeting nuclear infrastructure | Day after Ahmedabad crash, Delhi-bound Air India flight makes emergency landing in Thailand over bomb threat | Narendra Modi visits Air India flight crash site in Ahmedabad | British gay couple posted 'Goodbye India' video before boarding doomed Air India flight | Doctor couple's final selfie with 3 children on ill-fated Air India flight goes viral | After over a billion passengers flown, Air India crash ends Boeing 787 Dreamliner’s fatality-free run | Air India flight with 242 on board crashes moments after takeoff in Ahmedabad, all dead except one | Ex-Gujarat CM Vijay Rupani among 242 killed in Air India crash near Ahmedabad | Telangana engineer, who worked on Kaleshwaram irrigation project, held in disproportionate case
Photo Courtesy: Julian Prealps Nature Park

UNESCO designates eleven new biosphere reserves to global list

| @indiablooms | Jul 06, 2024, at 02:34 pm

The UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) on Friday designated 11 new biosphere reserves, recognizing their importance for conserving biodiversity and cultural heritage.

Mongolia, Philippines, the Republic of Korea and Spain.  

Additionally, and for the first time, the list includes two transboundary reserves, spanning Belgium and the Netherlands, and Italy and Slovenia.

Audrey Azoulay, Director-General of UNESCO emphasized that these designations come at a time when humanity is “grappling with a biodiversity crisis and climate disruption”.

“At a time when the international community is being called upon to increase the number of protected areas, these new biosphere reserves play an essential role in sustainably preserving the biodiversity, improving the living conditions of local populations and indigenous peoples and fostering scientific research,” she added.

Biosphere reserves are nominated by national governments and remain under the sovereign jurisdiction of the States where they are located. They are designated by UNESCO following an intergovernmental designation process the under the Man and Biodiversity (MAB) Programme.

Important purposes

UNESCO highlighted that biosphere reserves play an important scientific role, serving as a site for research and monitoring, providing valuable data and insights that can inform environmental management and policy decisions.

Furthermore, they help in achieving global development targets such as those set by the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, inter alia, on protecting and restoring significant portions of the Earth's ecosystems by 2030.

They also promote unique local sustainable development ideas, safeguard biodiversity, and combat climate change.

Global biosphere reserves  

The new reserves bring the World Network of Biosphere Reserves up to 759 sites in 136 countries and cover a total of 7,442,000 square kilometres (about 2,870,000 square miles), almost the size of Australia.

There are about 275 million people living in biosphere reserves worldwide.

The Network covers all major representative natural and semi-natural ecosystems.

Support Our Journalism

We cannot do without you.. your contribution supports unbiased journalism

IBNS is not driven by any ism- not wokeism, not racism, not skewed secularism, not hyper right-wing or left liberal ideals, nor by any hardline religious beliefs or hyper nationalism. We want to serve you good old objective news, as they are. We do not judge or preach. We let people decide for themselves. We only try to present factual and well-sourced news.

Support objective journalism for a small contribution.