The northern port city of Hai Phong is striving its utmost to
receive UNESCO recognition of its Cat Ba archipelago as a world natural
heritage site, a municipal official has said.
Chairman of
the Hai Phong People’s Committee Duong Anh Dien made the remarks at a
meeting with representatives of the International Union for
Conservation of Nature (IUCN), a special advisor of UNESCO for world
heritage, on September 28.
The meeting was an essential
element in the process of nominating Cat Ba archipelago as a site of
world natural heritage.
At the function, Dien confirmed that
both the Vietnamese Government and local authorities have worked hard
to conserve biological diversity on Cat Ba archipelago .
IUCN expert Peter Hitchcock introduced the steps in the nomination process.
Next, IUCN experts will make a field trip to Cat Ba archipelago ,
slated for October 3, before sending their evaluation report to UNESCO.
At the meeting, representatives of the Institute of
Marine Environment and Resources, the Vietnam Academy of Science and
Technology, and the management board of Cat Ba archipelago presented
the outstanding features of the area’s heritage.
Located
some 45 kilometres east of Haiphong and 150 kilometres southeast of
Hanoi , Cat Ba covers more than 17,000 hectares of land and 9,200
hectares of sea.
Recognised by UNESCO as a World Biosphere
Reserve, Cat Ba boasts a typical ecological system in Vietnam ,
including tropical rain forests on limestone islands, mangrove forests,
coral reefs, sea grass, sand beaches and cave networks.
Cat
Ba is home to some 2,320 different types of fauna and flora, including
740 land animals, 280 forest species, 540 seabed creatures, 200 fish
species, 180 coral reef organisms, 80 sea grass species and 20 different
wetland plants.-VNA