Seminar
Environmental Restoration on the Korean Peninsula

The two-day program started with a seminar on Environmental Restoration and Sustainability on the Korean Peninsula, which was held at the DMZ Museum in Goseong. Around half of the participants were local citizens and half were participants who joined us from Seoul. The seminar started at 1PM with an Opening Speech by Dr. Bernhard Seliger, the representative of the HSF Korea. Mr. Hyung-Wan Ham, Chairperson of the Goseong County Council, and representatives of the UniKorea Foundation also gave their congratulatory and welcome remarks.

Afterwards five experts held specialized topic presentations. Mr. Yat-tung Yu of the Hong Kong Bird Watching Society gave his thoughts on an international cooperation with sea birds and his suggestions for a possible South and North Korean cooperation with birds. In his presentations Mr. Yu stressed the importance of seabird conservational activities, organizations and networks such as the East Asian Australasian Flyway Partnership.

The second presentation “Korean border area conservation with birds” was held by Dr. Sang-Hoon Han of the Korea Wildlife Institute. He briefly delineated the worlds’ main migratory birds' flyways as well as the four most important Korean regional bird survey areas. This was followed by a deeper dive into the Status of Birds on the Korean Peninsula by Dr. Nial Moores of Birds Korea, where he addressed the critical need to improve current policies and decisions in the ROK.

In order to make a change projects on saving endangered migratory species need to be implemented. The Hanns Seidel Foundation Korea carries out a multitude of projects for the conservation of migratory birds and against the deforestation in Korea. In the fourth topic presentation “Birds Habitat – Lagoon in Goseong, East Sea” Mr. Seok-Geun Jang of the Korea Federation for Environmental Movement shared a wide number of projects regarding the conservation of migratory species, protection of wetlands and breeding grounds internationally and in the ROK. Although sharing knowledge about those topics is an important step towards change engaging in projects is just as important. The HSF Koreas projects were introduced by researcher Dr. Hyun-Ah Choi of the HSF as the final presentation.

In a discussion rounds after the presentations were held the audience was able to ask their questions to the experts.

Kim Yongsoo of the HSF moderated the whole seminar.

On the second day two field studies were conducted. One group went on a Field Study on the Korean borderlands where the Civilian Control Line, the Unification Observatory and the Geonbongsa Temple was visited. The other group consisted of Dr. Bernhard Seliger, Mr. Felix Glenk, Dr. Nial Moores and Mr. Yat-tung Yu who conducted a bird survey. Although the group was unable to catch a glimpse at some species such as the Red-necked Grebe due to the early timing in November other interesting species like the Ancient Murrelet could be found. 

We are thanking all the participants of the seminar, field study and survey for their interest, especially the DMZ Museum and the UniKorea Foundation for supporting the excursion.