Meeting
Biodiversity Goseong

Goseong County in Gangwon Province and Hanns Seidel Foundation (HSF) Korea have been partners for the sustainable development of the inner-Korean border area since 2005. In this time, they carried out several projects, like establishing an eco-trail in Seongjongri, had numerous joint seminars and workshops, and worked on the establishment of a partnership with Bayreuth county in Germany, in the former inner-German border area.

Dr. Bernhard Seliger and Kim Young-Soo of HSF Korea had meetings in the Goseong County office to discuss the possibility to carry out a project to establish eco-corridors particularly for amphibians, through “frog ladders”.

In the modern agricultural landscape of Korea, often deep concrete trenches prevent frogs, toads, reptiles and small mammals to cross into or from rice fields. For frogs, who migrate in the spring period from hills, where they winter, to rice paddies, and in autumn back, such trenches can mean a deadly trap, severely affecting frog populations. This also has negative effects on rice yields, since frogs eat bugs and snails living of rice, bird populations etc. Therefore, “eco-corridors”, where these animals can leave deep trenches, are basically mandatory, but lacking in many places. Last month, Trevor Rose of the British Herpetological Society on invitation of Birds Korea, a partner of HSF Korea, introduced a new way to install “frog ladders”, which he himself invented. These are much cheaper than concrete or wooden installations, and unobtrusive. In a meeting with Pyeon Yeong-Guk of the Environmental Department of Goseong County and Pastor Chang Seok-Geun, head of the environmental citizen group KFEM Goseong-Sokcho-Yangyang, the concept of frog ladders was explained and it was proposed to start a model project on frog ladders this year.

Also, HSF Korea discussed the progress of re-forestation in parts of Goseong hit very hard by forest fires last year with An Jae-Pil of the Forest Department of Goseong County. Hanns-Seidel-Foundation vowed to support afforestation of a plot of land as part of its project with Goseong in this year.