Marine Important Bird Areas

BirdLife International has moved toward the identification of Marine Important Bird Areas (mIBAs) for seabirds around the world. “Seabirds have deteriorated in IUCN Red List status faster than any other group of bird species,” said Ben Lascelles, BirdLife’s Global Marine IBA officer. “We urgently need to protect their habitats if we are to stop and reverse these rapid declines.”

BirdLife has established new guidelines for following seabirds and analyzing the data used to identify Marine IBAs, a major step towards establishing a global network of representative protected areas for seabirds.

BirdLife and its partners are now focused  on getting the outcomes of these standards endorsed by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) at an upcoming meeting in Ottawa, Canada.

For more on mIBAs, see details here:   
http://bit.ly/rBN7r