UNESCO’s World Heritage Site: IUCN Team To Visit Bhitarkanika National Park

Kendrapara: A team of International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) is scheduled to visit Bhitarkanika National Park in the first week of November to evaluate the conservation area to include it in UNESCO’s World Heritage site.

According to official sources, the Paris-based UNESCO has assigned the IUCN to evaluate the Bhitarkanika conservation area and to give a detailed report whether to include the Bhitarkanika National Park in World Heritage site or not.

UNESCO has asked the IUCN to conduct a field survey and technical evaluation for declaring the Bhitarkanika National Park as the World Heritage site, informed Bimal Prasanna Acharya, the DFO of Rajnagar.

A  three-member team of IUCN with four scientists of Dehradun-based Wildlife Institute of  India accompanied by the PCCF of Wildlife and PCCF (Forest) would visit the national park for technical evaluation on November 4.

As per the proposed scheduled program, they would evaluate the Bhitarkanika conservation area from November 4 to November 7, said official sources.

It may be noted here that the UNESCO earlier gave first phase clearance for enlisting Bhitarkanika National Park in the World’s Heritage Site.

The state forest department and Wildlife Institute of India had signed a memorandum of understanding for the compilation of a comprehensive database of biodiversity of Bhitarkanika National Park to collect wide rage information on the biodiversity, eco-system, the socio-economic status of the locals and their dependence on the forest produce.

The forest department earlier sent a proposal to UNESCO to enlist Bhitarkanika National Park in World Heritage site.