Too Late to Become a National Treasure? Qieding Wetland Has International Potential, Yet It's Being Paved Over as a Road?

Unclear Designation, a Wetland in Constant Crisis

An ID document is a symbol. Through clear markings, it records a person's name, birthday, parents and place of residence. Sometimes, in an emergency, if you can't produce your ID, the consequences can be serious. In fact, this isn't only true for people; for a complete ecological environment, "identity" matters even more.

Located north of Kaohsiung City, Qieding Wetland covers 171 hectares and has recorded more than 150 bird species. The highest count for a single bird population (Kentish plover) once reached 8,000, and the key reason it receives great attention from BirdLife International is that the number of black-faced spoonbills wintering at Qieding Wetland has already approached 5% of the global total.

According to Article 6 of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands criteria for internationally important wetlands, a wetland that supports more than 1% of the global population of a single waterbird species qualifies as an "internationally important wetland." However, Qieding Wetland today has only just entered the stage of applying for its ID card, holding only the status of "provisional important wetland" under the Wetland Conservation Act. Yet the Kaohsiung City Government's planned Road No. 1-4 project passing through Qieding Wetland is about to hold an environmental impact assessment conference on the afternoon of August 31 (Wednesday).

To this end, environmental groups in Kaohsiung City and local community organizations in Qieding urgently held a press conference on the morning of August 29, calling on the Kaohsiung City Government to immediately suspend the environmental impact assessment and to restart the relevant environmental impact assessment procedures only after the Ministry of the Interior announces Qieding Wetland as an internationally, nationally or locally important wetland.