Designations will be given to three wetlands areas, including he Imjin River estuary, other sites will be listed as national parks and Unesco Biosphere Reserves

By Jeon Jong-hwi, Writer

The government has decided to increase the number of protected areas within Korea’s Demilitarized Zone. It will also proceed with plans to designate certain areas as national parks and Unesco Biosphere Reserves. Currently, five areas in the DMZ are legally designated as protected, preventing all kinds of development from taking place therein.

On Thursday, the Ministry of the Environment stated that it was necessary to consider additional conservation measures for the DMZ because various government departments and local authorities were announcing plans for development in the area, despite its high ecological and scientific value. As a result of research conducted in the DMZ over the last three years, the ministry said, it plans to announce by next year priority designations for five of 30 protected areas.

Designations as wetland protection areas will be given to the Imjin River estuary in Paju; Togyo Reservoir and Yanguidae in Cheorwon County, Gangwon Province; and Hwajinpo Lake in Goseong County. Mt. Baegam, which lies in Hwacheon and Cheorwon Counties in Gangwon Province, is to be designated as an ecological and landscape protected area.

The Chopyeongdo and Jangdanbando Wetlands at the mouth of the Imjin River serve as stopovers and wintering sites for globally-endangered bird species such as the blackfaced spoonbill and Japanese crane. Investigations have found that the wetlands are home to more than 540 diverse species. The Togyo Reservoir, a migratory bird habitat located on the Cheorwon Plain, provides a magnificent spectacle on winter mornings with elegant dances by flocks of wild geese.

Yanguidae, located upstream from the Peace Dam, is currently the subject of efforts to achieve registration as a Unesco Biosphere Reserve and Transboundary Biosphere Reserve (an important area of outstanding ecological value that lies within the territory of at least two counties). To be registered with Unesco, sites must first receive a domestic legal designation as a protected area.

Mt. Baegam, a central area that connects the DMZ and the Baekdudaegan mountain range in an ecological axis, is known as a “treasure trove of biodiversity,” inhabited by 1,177 species including the “sanyang” (mountain goat), a grade 1 endangered species.

Designation as a protected area means that no buildings can be newly constructed or extended. The form and quality of the land cannot be altered, and the catching, hunting, picking and digging up of flora and fauna within the area is also forbidden. The Environment Ministry stated that it would pursue plans to designate protected areas as national parks and Unesco Biosphere Reserves according to separate plans, in order to ensure the DMZ would remain as a global ecological cultural heritage site for future generations.

Jeong In-cheol, an assistant administrator at Green Korea, said that since the Korea Forest Service had already designated a 50,000-hectare area of the eastern DMZ as a forest genetic resource protection area, the Ministry of the Environment would have to prevent fiscal waste

and duplicate management of resources through adequate consultation during the policy-making process. Jeong asserted that the first thing the ministry has to do is to withdraw its previous approval, granted to a local authority, for the construction of a cable car on Mt. Baegam.

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