Afghanistan Establishes First National Park
Good news from Afghanistan this week: the country declared its first internationally recognized national park today, called Band-e-Amir, which includes a striking series of six deep blue lakes in one of the country’s best-known natural areas.
The area of Band-e-Amir is near the Bamyan Valley, where 1,500-year-old giant Buddha statues once stood before being destroyed by the Taliban.
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Historically, Band-e-Amir was a destination to visit in Afghanistan since the 1950s, but from 1979-2001, the war kept many tourists away. Thousands of Afghan tourists and religious pilgrims now visit the area each year, and many other travellers are drawn to the beauty of the travertine dam network that separates the lakes.
Recent surveys of the park have found that it still contains ibex and urial, along with the Afghan snow finch, believed to be the only bird found exclusively in Afghanistan. Snow leopards were once found in the area but have not been sighted for years, having vanished due to hunting in the early 1980s. The park could be the beginning of the creation of an Afghan Protected Area System that may include the transboundary area in the Pamirs shared by Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Pakistan, and China, which contains a rich variety of wildlife.
“At its core, Band-e-Amir is an Afghan initiative supported by the international community. It is a park created for Afghans, by Afghans, for the new Afghanistan. Band-e-Amir will be Afghanistan’s first national park and sets the precedent for a future national park system.” - Dr. Steven E. Sanderson, President and CEO of the WCS
The establishment of the national park provides the international recognition essential for developing Band-e-Amir as an international tourist destination, and will assist the park in obtaining World Heritage Status. The National Environment Protection Agency (NEPA) of Afghanistan will manage the park, along with the Ministry of Agriculture, Irrigation and Livestock, and the Band-e-Amir Protected Area Committee.
Funding for creating the park came from the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS), and the WCS conducted the preliminary wildlife surveys, and helped to identify and delineate the boundaries of the park. WCS also helped the government to hire and train local rangers, developed the management plan for the park, and provided assistance to the government to craft the laws authorizing the park’s creation.
Images: Top:©Alex Dehgan/WCS - Gallery: Carl Montgomery at Flickr
That’s a beautiful lake. So blue, and so accentuated because there appears to be no vegetation anywhere around it. Let’s hope this land can be preserved.
It does look beautiful. It reminds me of the Columbia River where it runs through Washington.
It comes at a GREAT time …Its always a GREAT time for awareness. peace-
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It is good that Afghanistan’s government is able to build a national park. With the war going on, it is fairly likely that other parts of Afghanistan and wildlife are being destroyed and ravaged. This national park should help to preserve this landscape unless one of the sides decides to go into it which would be a tragedy as it is a very beautiful landscape. Before when I thought of Afghanistan, I thought of a mountainous and arid environment. These images show a completely different side of Afghanistan. Also, the fact that the government was able to make it a national park and take care of it shows that they are on their way to being able to govern themselves and the war will be over soon. While America should not leave the job half done, it would be a huge loss if anything were to happen to that national park.
Increasingly, Eco-Worldly is the place to turn for information on positive developments in research and cooperation between peoples of different nations. News of projects like this one are a welcome breath of fresh air.
I though they had all this b4 the Russians invaded and tor up the country, First is such a strong word.
This is a great move because once peace returns to the area, there will be protected areas.
Waiting in earnest until the Taliban decrees national parks to be antiIslam.
Najibullah was in the latter part of the Soviet occupation, not before.