Ramsar Convention on Wetlands: Guide

The Ramsar Convention, adopted on 2 February 1971 in Ramsar, Iran, is the oldest of the modern global intergovernmental environmental treaties. It obligates its 172 contracting parties to conserve and sustainably use wetlands, designate at least one Wetland of International Importance, and cooperate across boundaries on shared wetland systems. As of September 2025 the global Ramsar Site network covers 2,546 sites totalling more than 257 million hectares, a territory larger than Western Europe.

The Convention’s formal title is the Convention on Wetlands of International Importance especially as Waterfowl Habitat, a name that reflects its ornithological origins but long ago ceased to capture its scope. Today the treaty covers every wetland type from peatlands to coral reefs, and it governs the relationship between wetlands and port development, coastal infrastructure, and shipping operations as directly as any instrument outside the IMO framework. Planners and operators working near estuaries, mangrove coasts, or tidal flats need to understand its designation system, its ecological-character doctrine, and its reporting obligations to avoid triggering Article 3.2 notifications that can halt infrastructure approvals.

Origins and Adoption

The Convention’s institutional prehistory runs through the 1960s ornithological community. The International Wildfowl Research Bureau, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), and the International Council for Bird Preservation had been tracking the rapid drainage of European and Asian wetlands used by migratory waterfowl. Key figures included Luc Hoffmann of the Tour du Valat research station in the Camargue and Geoffrey Matthews of the Wildfowl & Wetlands Trust at Slimbridge, England, who pressed for a binding instrument with formal site-listing.

Iran hosted a conference at the Caspian Sea resort city of Ramsar from 30 January to 3 February 1971. Eighteen nations signed the final text on 2 February 1971. The Convention was registered with UNESCO as the treaty depositary. Because it required seven ratifications to enter force, it did not become binding international law until 21 December 1975, when the seventh instrument of ratification was deposited.

The first Conference of the Contracting Parties (COP1) met in Cagliari, Italy, from 24 to 29 November 1980, nearly a decade after adoption. That gap reflects the Convention’s initially modest membership and secretariat capacity. IUCN served as the de facto administrative bureau until the Ramsar Secretariat was formally established. The Secretariat is now located at IUCN headquarters in Gland, Switzerland, and its staff hold IUCN contracts while answering to the Standing Committee on behalf of the Parties.

The original treaty text has been amended twice. The Paris Protocol (adopted 1982, entered force 1986) and the Regina Amendments (adopted at COP3 in Regina, Canada in 1987, entered force 1994) adjusted the budget and voting arrangements. The Regina Amendments also produced the Convention’s most consequential policy addition: the formal adoption of the “wise use” principle as the guiding obligation for all wetlands within a contracting party’s territory, not merely for listed sites.

The Three Pillars

The Convention’s implementation framework rests on three interlocking obligations that the Secretariat describes as the three pillars:

Every contracting party must satisfy all three pillars. Pillar 2 creates the legal hook that most directly intersects with infrastructure development: any dredging, land reclamation, or facility construction that is “likely to change the ecological character” of a listed Ramsar Site triggers a mandatory Article 3.2 notification to the Secretariat, even if the activity is otherwise fully permitted under national law.

The Wise Use Principle

Wise use is the conceptual core of the Convention and has been progressively refined through a series of COP resolutions. The working definition adopted at COP1 in 1980 was broad; the concept was made a formal pillar at COP3 (Regina, 1987); it received its current authoritative formulation at COP9 (Kampala, Uganda, 2005) in Resolution IX.1 Annex A:

“Wise use of wetlands is the maintenance of their ecological character, achieved through the implementation of ecosystem approaches, within the context of sustainable development.”

The linked concept of ecological character is defined in the same resolution: “the combination of the ecosystem components, processes and benefits/services that characterise the wetland at a given point in time.” A change in ecological character is thus any human-induced adverse alteration of any component, process, or service. This is a deliberately broad standard. Reduced freshwater inflow, increased turbidity from dredging, saltwater intrusion from port channel deepening, or chronic low-level contamination from bilge discharges can each qualify as a change in ecological character, even if the physical footprint of the activity lies outside the designated site boundary.

The wise-use obligation applies to all wetlands, not only those on the Ramsar List. Article 3.1 requires parties to “formulate and implement their planning so as to promote the conservation of the wetlands included in the List, and as far as possible the wise use of wetlands in their territory.” The qualifier “as far as possible” applies to non-listed sites; the conservation obligation for listed sites carries no such qualification and is therefore treated as essentially absolute under the Convention’s interpretive practice.

Ramsar Handbooks translate wise use into operational guidance on topics ranging from Environmental Impact Assessment for wetland-adjacent development to the integration of wetlands into river-basin management. The handbook series covers water allocation, invasive species management, and the application of the ecosystem-services concept to wetland valuation, all of which are relevant when regulators evaluate port expansion or dredge-spoil disposal near listed sites.

Designation of Ramsar Sites

Any contracting party may designate one or more Ramsar Sites at any time by submitting an information sheet to the Secretariat together with a map delimiting the site boundary. There is no formal approval process by the COP or any expert panel: the Secretariat registers the designation upon receipt of the information sheet, provided the party demonstrates that the site meets at least one criterion. This contrasts with the UNESCO World Heritage Convention, which requires nomination, expert evaluation, and COP approval before listing.

The minimum requirement at accession is designation of at least one site. In practice most parties designate several sites at accession and continue adding sites over subsequent years. As of September 2025 the global network comprised 2,546 sites covering 257,994,728 hectares. The UK leads with 175 sites; Mexico holds 142. India has 96 sites covering more than 1.3 million hectares, a figure that reflects a sustained national designation programme over 2023 to 2025.

The total network area exceeds 257 million hectares but this figure includes freshwater, peatland, coastal, and marine wetland types. Marine and coastal wetlands represent around 7% of the world’s estimated 12.1 million km² of wetland coverage, yet they contribute disproportionately to biodiversity and carbon storage.

The Nine Criteria

A site qualifies for designation if it meets at least one of the nine criteria, grouped into two sets. The first set (Criteria 1 to 4) covers representativeness and species-based values applicable to all wetland types. The second set (Criteria 5 to 9) focuses on specific waterbird and fish population thresholds.

Criteria applicable to all wetland types:

Criterion 1: A wetland should be considered internationally important if it contains a representative, rare, or unique example of a natural or near-natural wetland type found within the appropriate biogeographic region.

Criterion 2: A wetland should be considered internationally important if it supports vulnerable, endangered, or critically endangered species, or threatened ecological communities.

Criterion 3: A wetland should be considered internationally important if it supports populations of plant and/or animal species important for maintaining the biological diversity of a particular biogeographic region.

Criterion 4: A wetland should be considered internationally important if it supports plant and/or animal species at a critical stage in their life cycles, or provides refuge during adverse conditions.

Criteria based on waterbirds:

Criterion 5: A wetland should be considered internationally important if it regularly supports 20,000 or more waterbirds.

Criterion 6: A wetland should be considered internationally important if it regularly supports 1% of the individuals in a population of one species or subspecies of waterbird.

Criteria based on fish:

Criterion 7: A wetland should be considered internationally important if it supports a significant proportion of indigenous fish subspecies, species, or families, life-history stages, species interactions, and/or populations that are representative of wetland benefits and/or values and thereby contributes to global biological diversity.

Criterion 8: A wetland should be considered internationally important if it is an important source of food for fish, a spawning ground, a nursery, and/or a migration path on which fish stocks, either within the wetland or elsewhere, depend.

Criteria based on other taxa:

Criterion 9: A wetland should be considered internationally important if it regularly supports 1% of the individuals in a population of one species or subspecies of wetland-dependent non-avian animal species.

Criteria 5, 6, and 9 set hard numerical floors. A site must “regularly” meet the threshold, meaning it does so in most years. A port authority proposing to deepen an approach channel through a tidal flat that regularly hosts 25,000 overwintering ducks automatically encounters Criterion 5, regardless of the wetland’s listed status, once the national authority begins considering whether to propose the site for designation or to notify under Article 3.2.

The Montreux Record

The Montreux Record is a subsidiary register of Ramsar Sites “where changes in ecological character have occurred, are occurring, or are likely to occur as a result of technological developments, pollution or other human interference.” It was established by COP4 in Montreux, Switzerland in 1990. The Record is maintained under Article 3.2 of the Convention and carries no additional legal obligations beyond those that already apply to all Ramsar Sites: it is a political instrument, not a penalty.

As of 2025 the Record contains 46 sites covering 3,690,667 hectares. No sites have been added or removed since 2021. Contracting parties may request listing of a site, or request that a listed site be removed once the threatening condition is remedied and the Ramsar Advisory Mission (RAM) has verified restoration. In India, Keoladeo National Park (Rajasthan) and Loktak Lake (Manipur) remain on the Record.

The RAM is the Convention’s primary field-assessment mechanism. A party may invite a RAM to assess the condition of a threatened site; the mission produces a technical report with recommendations. Compliance with RAM recommendations is voluntary but politically costly to ignore, particularly for parties that are also subject to scrutiny under the CBD or CITES.

The Montreux Record’s limitation is coverage: it only captures sites where parties have self-reported a problem or where the Secretariat has flagged a concern. Sites degraded by incremental infrastructure encroachment over many years, including the dredging and reclamation associated with port expansion, often show no single event that triggers an Article 3.2 notification and so may never reach the Record even as their ecological character deteriorates.

Governance and the Secretariat

The Convention’s institutional architecture has four components.

Conference of the Contracting Parties (COP): The governing body that meets every three years. COP15 convened in Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe from 23 to 31 July 2025. It adopted 25 resolutions including the Fifth Strategic Plan 2025 to 2034, structured around four goals and 18 targets. Goal 1 addresses reversing wetland loss; Goal 2 covers wise use through policy and planning; Goal 3 covers effective management of Ramsar Sites; Goal 4 covers implementation through scientific cooperation and financing. The next COP (COP16) will meet in Panama in 2028.

Russia’s denunciation of the Convention took effect on 21 December 2025, reducing the number of contracting parties. Saudi Arabia joined as a new contracting party in 2025, announced at COP15. The annotated contracting parties list published 21 December 2025 reflects these changes.

Standing Committee: The executive committee between COPs. It meets annually, supervises the budget, and can take emergency decisions between plenary sessions.

Scientific and Technical Review Panel (STRP): The subsidiary technical body. The STRP provides scientific guidance on criteria application, site assessment methods, climate-change impacts on wetlands, and the integration of wetland considerations into other policy frameworks. Its recommendations to the COP are advisory, not binding.

Secretariat: Based at IUCN headquarters in Gland, Switzerland. Staff hold IUCN employment contracts but answer to the Standing Committee. The Secretariat maintains the Ramsar List, provides technical assistance to parties, coordinates the RAM programme, and produces the Global Wetland Outlook. The 2025 edition of the Outlook, released at COP15, documented the loss of 411 million hectares of wetlands since 1970, representing 22% of the global total, with an ongoing annual decline rate of 0.52%.

Coastal and Estuarine Wetlands

The Convention’s Article 1.1 definition of wetlands is notably broad. Wetlands include “areas of marsh, fen, peatland or water, whether natural or artificial, permanent or temporary, with water that is static or flowing, fresh, brackish or salt, including areas of marine water the depth of which at low tide does not exceed six metres.” This definition explicitly captures tidal flats, estuaries, delta systems, mangrove forests, seagrass meadows, coral reefs within the six-metre contour, and nearshore subtidal zones. All are wetland types directly affected by shipping, port operations, and coastal development.

Mangrove forests illustrate the intersection most clearly. Globally, mangroves occupy roughly 14.7 million hectares, concentrated across tropical and subtropical coastlines. Many of the world’s busiest ports developed in or adjacent to mangrove estuaries: the Port of Klang (Malaysia), the Port of Santos (Brazil), and numerous West African container terminals all operate in historical mangrove zones. Where mangrove areas or the estuaries they front have been designated as Ramsar Sites, port expansion proposals must address the Article 3.2 notification obligation and, in many jurisdictions, a formal Environmental Impact Assessment that specifically evaluates changes in ecological character.

Tidal flats are a parallel concern. The Yellow Sea tidal flat complex, which supports the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, has been progressively designated as Ramsar Sites since the 2000s. Several sections of the Chinese and South Korean coastlines in this complex hold Ramsar designations alongside heavy port and industrial development. The Getbol Korean Tidal Flat, inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2021 and already holding Ramsar designations for its four components, is a documented example of overlapping international designations on a tidal flat that lies within a major shipping corridor.

Seagrass beds and shallow subtidal habitats within the six-metre contour face particular pressure from anchor damage, propeller wash, and turbidity caused by dredging. Propeller wash in shallow water can uproot seagrass rhizomes at distances of 50 to 100 metres from the vessel track. Several Ramsar Sites in the Mediterranean, Persian Gulf, and Caribbean include seagrass meadows that are technically within the legal definition of the site boundary yet are routinely crossed by vessel traffic operating on publicly permitted routes.

Notable Coastal, Estuarine, and Mangrove Ramsar Sites near Shipping Lanes

Coastal Ramsar Sites are not confined to remote shorelines. Many designated wetlands lie directly adjacent to major port complexes or inside busy shipping corridors, creating legally complex situations where vessel operations, port infrastructure, and conservation obligations overlap in the same geographic space.

Sundarbans (Bangladesh and India)

The Sundarbans is the world’s largest mangrove forest, covering approximately 10,000 km² across the Ganges-Brahmaputra-Meghna delta on the Bay of Bengal. Bangladesh designated its portion as a Ramsar Site in 1992; India’s Sundarban Wetland has held Ramsar status since 2019. Both portions are also UNESCO World Heritage Sites. The Bangladesh section alone covers 601,700 hectares and supports the Bengal tiger, Irrawaddy dolphins, and roughly 260 species of fish.

The Sundarbans is not ecologically isolated from shipping. Mongla Port, Bangladesh’s second-largest seaport, sits at the northeastern edge of the designated area. Numerous inland waterway routes cross the delta, and large commercial vessels use channels through the mangrove network to reach Mongla. On 9 December 2014, the tanker Southern Star VII, carrying 350,000 litres of furnace oil, was struck by a cargo vessel on the Shela River inside the Sundarbans and sank. The oil spread over an estimated 350 km² within eight days, reaching mangrove root systems and the feeding zones of the Irrawaddy dolphin population. A joint UN and Bangladesh government assessment found significant impact on plankton, juvenile fish, and shoreline vegetation. Bangladesh did not file a formal Article 3.2 notification with the Ramsar Secretariat for this incident, illustrating the self-reporting gap in the Convention’s enforcement architecture.

Chilika Lake (India)

Chilika Lake, designated in 1981 as India’s first Ramsar Site, is the largest brackish-water lagoon in Asia, covering 116,500 hectares on the Odisha coast. It lies approximately 100 km south of the Port of Paradip, one of India’s largest major ports handling roughly 100 million tonnes of cargo per year. Chilika opens to the Bay of Bengal through a tidal inlet and is subject to sediment dynamics influenced by dredging activity in the surrounding coastal zone. The lake supports 261 fish species, 28 prawn species, the only Indian population of the Irrawaddy dolphin, and serves as a wintering ground for around 1 million migratory waterbirds annually.

The Chilika Development Authority was established by the Government of Odisha in 1992 specifically to address the lake’s declining fish catches and deteriorating tidal exchange. A key intervention was the opening of a new sea mouth in 2000, which restored tidal connectivity and reversed much of the earlier ecological degradation. Chilika was consequently removed from the Montreux Record in 2002 as one of the few documented cases of successful restoration of a listed site to a healthy ecological character. The lake’s recovery depended on hydrological restoration, not pollution remediation, a pattern directly relevant to estuarine sites where port-related dredging affects tidal exchange.

Camargue (France)

The Camargue, at the mouth of the Rhône in southern France, was designated a Ramsar Site on 1 December 1986, covering 930 km². It sits immediately north of the Gulf of Fos, which contains the main port facilities of the Grand Port Maritime de Marseille. Fos-sur-Mer, the port’s primary industrial terminal, handles container traffic, petroleum products, and liquefied natural gas, and its approach channels and industrial drainage discharge into the same coastal system fed by the Rhône. The Camargue supports 356 bird species, 75% of France’s waterbird diversity, and hosts breeding colonies of greater flamingos whose foraging ranges extend into the coastal marine zone adjacent to the port complex.

The Grand Port Maritime de Marseille has published sustainability commitments addressing its relationship with the Camargue Ramsar Site, including monitoring of underwater noise, turbidity in approach channels, and coordination with the Camargue Regional Natural Park on dredge-spoil disposal sites. This is one of the few documented cases where a port authority has formally integrated Ramsar Site obligations into its environmental management system as a routine operational requirement rather than a project-by-project EIA response.

Yellow Sea Tidal Flats (China and Republic of Korea)

The tidal flats of the Yellow Sea, shared by China and the Republic of Korea, constitute one of the most ecologically important coastal wetland systems on Earth. They serve as the primary stopover habitat for millions of shorebirds on the East Asian-Australasian Flyway, including the critically endangered spoon-billed sandpiper and the bar-tailed godwit. Studies published in Bird Conservation International calculated that 28% of the Yellow Sea’s tidal flats disappeared between the 1980s and 2014, driven primarily by land reclamation for ports, chemical plants, and agriculture.

The Caofeidian industrial zone in Bohai Bay, Hebei Province, China, represents one of the largest documented cases of tidal-flat reclamation adjacent to a shipping route. Construction began in 2002 on an artificial island complex now housing a major steel plant, power station, and deep-water port with a designed draught of 25 metres. Research published in Bird Conservation International documented that reclamation at Caofeidian and surrounding Bohai Bay sites destroyed critical staging habitat for waterbird populations meeting Criterion 6 thresholds, yet none of the affected tidal areas in China’s Bohai Bay held formal Ramsar designation at the time of reclamation.

In the Republic of Korea, the Getbol Korean Tidal Flats encompass four component Ramsar Sites that were collectively inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in July 2021. All four components, Seocheon Getbol, Gochang Getbol, Shinan Getbol, and Boseong-Suncheon Getbol, carry Ramsar status and together support 2,150 recorded species, including 22 globally threatened or near-threatened taxa. The Getbol sites lie within a shipping-dense coastal zone served by the ports of Gunsan, Mokpo, and Yeosu, and the Yellow Sea shipping lanes are within direct view of the tidal flats at low water.

Western Port (Australia)

Western Port, Victoria, was updated with a new Ramsar Information Sheet published in December 2025. The site covers extensive saltmarsh and mangrove zones that serve as habitat for migratory waterbirds listed under international agreements and as nursery habitat for commercially important fish and invertebrate species. Western Port is also the site of the Port of Hastings, a deep-water bulk cargo facility handling coal exports, and has been subject to multiple assessments of potential port expansion that would require Article 3.2 notification under Australia’s National Guidelines for Ramsar Wetlands. Australia’s national guidelines, one of the most detailed in any contracting party, require an Ecological Character Description to be completed before any Article 3.2 notification can be submitted, and the Gippsland Lakes Ramsar Site (a separate site in Victoria) has the most fully documented case of port-related ecological change in the Australian network.

The Scientific and Technical Review Panel

The Scientific and Technical Review Panel (STRP) is the Convention’s permanent scientific advisory body. It was established by Resolution 5.5 at COP5 in Kushiro, Japan in 1993. The STRP sits as a subsidiary body of the COP and operates between COPs under the authority of the Standing Committee.

Composition and membership

The STRP is appointed by the Management Working Group of the Standing Committee for each three-year triennium. The 2023 to 2025 panel comprised 18 members drawn from all six Convention geographic regions, serving in their expert capacity rather than as national representatives. STRP members include scientists from universities, national research institutions, and the International Organization Partners (Wetlands International, IUCN, Birdlife International, the International Water Management Institute, and WWF International), all of whom have observer status at STRP meetings. COP15 at Victoria Falls approved the composition and work programme for the 2025 to 2028 triennium under Resolution XV.10.

Each contracting party may additionally appoint an STRP National Focal Point: an acknowledged wetland science expert who acts as liaison between national wetland practitioners and the STRP panel. National Focal Points provide country-level data for STRP assessments and help distribute STRP outputs through national scientific and policy networks.

Work programme for 2025 to 2028

The 2025 to 2028 work programme is structured around four thematic areas, confirmed by the first meeting of the new panel (STRP28) held after COP15. Thematic Work Area 1 covers the development of the Ramsar Site network and the application of the nine criteria, including a review of whether updated population data require revision of the numerical thresholds in Criteria 5, 6, and 9. Thematic Work Area 2 addresses tools for wetland assessment, mapping, and inventory, with a specific focus on integrating Earth-observation satellite data into ecological character monitoring. Thematic Work Area 3 addresses direct and climate-change-related pressures on wetlands, their documented impacts, and policy responses. Thematic Work Area 4 covers wise use, sustainable management, and wetland restoration in the broader landscape and seascape context.

For the maritime and coastal zone, Thematic Work Area 3 is most directly relevant: it explicitly covers infrastructure-driven habitat loss, including the impacts of port expansion, channel dredging, land reclamation, and sediment management on coastal and estuarine Ramsar Sites. STRP outputs from this work area are submitted to the COP as technical reports and, when adopted, become Ramsar Handbooks guiding national EIA practice. The STRP does not issue binding rulings; its authority lies in the scientific credibility of its reports and in their formal adoption by the COP.

Key past outputs relevant to coastal infrastructure

Prior STRP deliverables that directly affect port and shipping-adjacent site management include the Ramsar Wise Use Handbooks (multiple editions, covering EIA, ecological character descriptions, and integration into river basin management), the technical report on the application of Article 3.2 published as supporting documentation for COP8, and the guidance on using remote sensing for monitoring ecological character change. The STRP’s 2021 to 2023 work produced guidance aligning the Convention’s monitoring framework with the indicators developed under the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, enabling parties to report simultaneously to both Ramsar and the CBD.

The Fifth Strategic Plan 2025 to 2034 and COP15 Outcomes

COP15 at Victoria Falls, Zimbabwe, running from 23 to 31 July 2025, was the Convention’s fifteenth plenary and produced 25 resolutions. The central deliverable was the adoption of the Fifth Strategic Plan 2025 to 2034, structured around four goals and 18 targets.

Vision and structure

The vision of the Fifth Strategic Plan is: “A world living in harmony with nature where wetlands are valued, conserved, restored and wisely used, supporting a healthy planet and delivering benefits for all people.” This language deliberately aligns with the vision of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework adopted at CBD COP15 in December 2022.

Goal 1: Reversing wetland loss

Goal 1 targets the reversal of the global trajectory of wetland loss and degradation. Its targets include halting net wetland loss, restoring at least 30% of degraded wetlands in each contracting party’s territory by 2030 (aligned with the CBD 30x30 target), and ensuring that wetland restoration contributes measurably to Nationally Determined Contributions under the Paris Agreement. The GWO 2025 data released at COP15, documenting 411 million hectares lost since 1970 and a continuing decline of 0.52% per year, provided the quantitative baseline against which progress will be measured.

Goal 2: Wise use through policy integration

Goal 2 requires contracting parties to integrate wetland values into national policy frameworks, spatial planning processes, and Environmental Impact Assessment systems. Targets under Goal 2 address the adoption of national wetland policies that cover all wetland types (not only designated Ramsar Sites), inclusive governance arrangements with indigenous and local communities, and the mainstreaming of wetland values into national development planning. For port authorities and coastal regulators, Goal 2’s spatial-planning targets mean that national governments committed to the Fifth Strategic Plan are expected to have national frameworks that capture Ramsar Site obligations in EIA regulations before new port projects receive approval.

Goal 3: Effective site management

Goal 3 focuses on the 2,546 designated Ramsar Sites. Its targets include requiring all sites to have current Ecological Character Descriptions (ECDs) by 2030, operationalizing the Article 3.2 notification system so that all changes meeting the legal threshold are reported, and ensuring that the Montreux Record is used actively rather than left static. The current Record of 46 sites has had no movement since 2021; the Goal 3 targets explicitly call for this to change.

Goal 4: Scientific cooperation and financing

Goal 4 covers the institutional capacity needed to deliver the other three goals. The 2025 to 2027 triennium budget of CHF 15.5 million, a 4.1% increase over the prior period, was adopted under this goal. COP15 did not establish a dedicated Ramsar financing mechanism comparable to the Global Environment Facility windows available to the CBD, but it endorsed the principle that wetland restoration contributions to nationally determined climate commitments should be eligible for climate finance, including through the Green Climate Fund. This opens a potential pathway for coastal wetland restoration projects, including sites affected by port development, to access climate finance alongside their Ramsar conservation obligations.

COP15 Victoria Falls Declaration

COP15 also produced the Victoria Falls Declaration, a non-binding political statement emphasizing political will, resource mobilization, and investment in sustainable wetland management. The Declaration highlighted commitments to freshwater ecosystem restoration, protection of migratory birds, and stronger criteria for designating Wetlands of International Importance. Saudi Arabia’s accession to the Convention was announced at COP15, adding its coastal and estuarine wetlands along the Red Sea and Arabian Gulf to the Ramsar network.

Global Wetland Outlook 2025: Key Findings on Wetland Loss

The Global Wetland Outlook 2025 (GWO 2025), published by the Ramsar Secretariat and released at COP15 in July 2025, is the third edition of a report series begun in 2018. It is the most detailed global assessment of wetland condition, loss, and economic value produced under the Convention. Its headline conclusions carry direct implications for coastal infrastructure planning.

Extent of loss since 1970

The GWO 2025 calculated that at least 411 million hectares of wetlands have been lost since 1970, representing a 22% reduction in global wetland extent. The average annual rate of loss stands at 0.52% per year. Without intervention, the report projects that a further 20% of remaining wetlands could disappear by 2050. That would eliminate roughly 280 million additional hectares, an area larger than Western Europe, within 25 years.

Species dependent on these wetlands have declined even faster than the habitats themselves. The Living Planet Index for freshwater-dependent species recorded an 83% average population decline between 1970 and the early 2020s, a steeper fall than any other vertebrate group and one of the sharpest biodiversity losses documented in any global assessment.

Coastal wetland carbon and economic value

The GWO 2025 quantified the global economic benefit of surviving wetlands at up to USD 39 trillion per year, or roughly 7.5% of global GDP. Without decisive intervention, the report projects that continued wetland loss will erode this USD 39 trillion benefit stream, affecting flood protection, water supply, food security, and carbon sequestration at scale.

Coastal wetlands deliver a disproportionate share of this value relative to their area. Mangroves, saltmarshes, and seagrass beds sequester carbon at rates five to ten times higher per unit area than tropical forests, making them critical components of any credible net-zero strategy that includes land-use sinks. Coastal wetlands also buffer storm surge: each kilometre of intact mangrove can attenuate wave energy by 50 to 70%, a service of direct relevance to port facilities in tropical cyclone zones.

Threats and drivers

The GWO 2025 identifies five primary drivers of wetland loss operating simultaneously: agricultural expansion into wetland margins, pollution from industrial and municipal sources, infrastructure development (ports, roads, urban areas), hydrological disruption from dams and water extraction, and the effects of climate change including sea-level rise and changed precipitation patterns. No single driver dominates in all regions: in Asia and the Pacific, infrastructure development and land reclamation for port and urban development account for a larger share of coastal wetland loss than in other regions. In Africa, agricultural drainage is the primary driver, but port-related reclamation is increasing along West and East African coast.

Regional degradation trends

Around 25% of remaining wetlands globally are in poor ecological condition, a proportion increasing in all regions. Wetlands in Africa, Latin America, and the Caribbean are facing the worst current degradation rates, but ecological deterioration has risen in Europe, North America, and Oceania as well. The GWO 2025 singles out the loss of coastal wetland cover adjacent to port and industrial zones as a category requiring specific policy attention because these sites combine high ecological sensitivity with high development pressure.

Port and Coastal Development: Documented Cases under Ramsar Obligations

The interaction between port development and Ramsar Site obligations has produced a number of documented cases where Article 3.2 notification obligations were either triggered, disputed, or found to have been breached. These cases illustrate how the Convention’s obligations operate in practice and where its enforcement gaps remain.

Gippsland Lakes, Australia

The Gippsland Lakes in Victoria, Australia, were listed as a Ramsar Site in 1982. The system is a complex coastal lagoon behind barrier dunes that was closed to the ocean at European arrival. A navigable entrance was cut in 1889 to allow port access, and the entrance channel was deepened to more than 5 metres in 2008 to maintain commercial navigation. The deepening fundamentally altered the tidal dynamics of the lakes, increasing marine water exchange in a system that had been progressively freshening since 1889.

Documented consequences include the appearance of bull sharks (Carcharhinus leucas) in the upper lakes, decline of fringing freshwater Melaleuca ericifolia vegetation, and repeated blooms of toxic cyanobacteria over areas that had not previously experienced them. A third-party Article 3.2 notification was submitted to the Ramsar Secretariat. The Australian federal government did not file its own notification, stating that no agreed “limits of acceptable change” had been formally breached, because no completed Ecological Character Description existed at the time of deepening to establish what the pre-dredge baseline actually was. This case is now cited in the academic literature, including a March 2026 analysis in the journal Wetlands (Springer Nature), as the defining example of how the absence of a pre-development ECD undermines the Article 3.2 system.

Saemangeum, Republic of Korea

The Saemangeum tidal flat reclamation project on Korea’s west coast involved the construction of a 33-kilometre sea dike beginning in 1991, with the dike completed in 2006. The project converted 401 km² of intertidal habitat to freshwater reservoir and industrial land. Studies by BirdLife International and the East Asian-Australasian Flyway Partnership documented population declines of 20 to 30% in several shorebird species that had used the site as a critical staging area, including the great knot (Calidris tenuirostris) and the bar-tailed godwit. At the time of reclamation, the Saemangeum tidal flats did not carry formal Ramsar designation. This gap between ecological significance and designation status has been cited in STRP guidance as a reason why national authorities should assess potential designation before approving major coastal reclamation.

Ichkeul National Park, Tunisia

Ichkeul National Park in northern Tunisia has been a Ramsar Site since 1980 and a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1980. It was added to the Montreux Record in 1996 after a series of dams on the rivers feeding Ichkeul Lake progressively reduced freshwater inflow, increasing salinity and reducing the aquatic vegetation on which hundreds of thousands of wintering waterbirds depended. A joint Ramsar-World Heritage reactive monitoring mission in 2006 documented partial restoration after dam operating rules were modified, but the site remained on the Montreux Record as of 2025. Ichkeul is not a port-adjacent site, but it is the most fully documented case of a joint Ramsar-World Heritage reactive monitoring mission and illustrates the layered governance available when a site holds both designations.

CBD, World Heritage Convention, and the SDGs

The Ramsar Convention does not operate in isolation. Its obligations and monitoring mechanisms are embedded in a broader architecture of intergovernmental environmental agreements and the UN Sustainable Development Goals, all of which shape the regulatory environment for coastal infrastructure.

Convention on Biological Diversity

The CBD designated the Ramsar Convention as its lead implementation partner on wetland matters, an arrangement formalized through successive joint work plans since 2000. The Sixth Joint Work Plan, covering 2024 to 2030, was endorsed by CBD COP16 in Rome in November 2025. This plan aligns Ramsar reporting with the monitoring framework of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (KM-GBF), adopted at CBD COP15 in December 2022.

The KM-GBF contains two targets of direct relevance to coastal and port-adjacent wetlands. Target 2 requires contracting parties to restore at least 30% of degraded terrestrial, inland freshwater, and coastal and marine ecosystems by 2030. Target 3, the “30x30” target, requires effective conservation and management of at least 30% of land, inland waters, and oceans by 2030. Implementation of both targets for aquatic and coastal ecosystems runs substantially through the Ramsar Site designation and management system. Parties reporting to the CBD on these targets are expected to count Ramsar Site designations and restoration projects as evidence of compliance with Targets 2 and 3. This creates a dual reporting incentive: a government that neglects its Ramsar Site management obligations will also have difficulty demonstrating KM-GBF compliance.

UNESCO World Heritage Convention

Well over 200 UNESCO World Heritage Sites overlap geographically with Ramsar Sites. The two conventions share UNESCO as depositary for Ramsar and as the secretariat host for World Heritage, creating an institutional proximity that facilitates joint monitoring missions. Examples of sites carrying both designations include the Sundarbans (Bangladesh and India), the Danube Delta (Romania), the Everglades (USA), Ichkeul National Park (Tunisia), Djoudj National Park (Senegal), Doñana National Park (Spain), and the Getbol Korean Tidal Flats. All of these sites also interact with shipping or coastal industrial activity to varying degrees.

The World Heritage Convention has stronger political pressure mechanisms than Ramsar for development threats: a site placed on the World Heritage List in Danger carries significant international reputational consequences and has in practice led to infrastructure project cancellations or redesigns in several documented cases. Ramsar Sites that are also World Heritage Sites can therefore draw on both sets of political leverage. The 2024 to 2025 period saw UNESCO and Ramsar Secretariat staff cooperate on a joint advisory framework for development-threatened sites holding both designations, following recommendations from the COP14 period.

Sustainable Development Goals

The Ramsar Secretariat has mapped the Convention’s obligations across at least five SDGs. SDG 6 (Clean Water and Sanitation) covers wetland water-regulation services; SDG 13 (Climate Action) covers wetland carbon storage and coastal protection; SDG 14 (Life Below Water) covers the marine and coastal wetland dimensions of the Convention’s scope; SDG 15 (Life on Land) covers freshwater and terrestrial wetland biodiversity. SDG 12 (Responsible Consumption and Production) intersects with the wise-use principle and with sustainable fisheries management in estuarine Ramsar Sites. The Convention’s mission statement explicitly identifies sustainable development as the framework within which wise use operates, making the SDG alignment structural rather than incidental.

For port developers and shipping operators, the SDG linkages matter because national governments increasingly use SDG reporting as the framework for environmental commitment documents submitted to multilateral development banks and export credit agencies. A port project that can show compatibility with Ramsar obligations simultaneously demonstrates alignment with SDG 14 and SDG 15, improving access to development finance that conditions lending on environmental and social standards.

Ramsar Regional Initiatives

The Convention supports 22 Ramsar Regional Initiatives (RRIs) that help contracting parties implement the Convention at sub-global scale through training, capacity-building, and regional cooperation. RRIs fall into two categories: regional Ramsar Centres, which provide training and scientific cooperation, and Ramsar Networks, which focus on regional cooperation on specific wetland systems or types.

CREHO, the Centro Regional Ramsar para el Hemisferio Occidental, established at COP7 in 1999, is the primary centre serving Latin America and the Caribbean. The Caribbean Regional Initiative for Wetlands addresses the small-island context of Caribbean parties, where coastal and marine wetlands, mangroves, seagrass beds, and coral reefs are the dominant designated wetland types and where cruise-ship traffic and port development present the most immediate shipping-related pressures. A Regional Initiative for the Conservation and Rational Use of Mangroves and Coral Reefs addresses the three Convention pillars explicitly for these coastal ecosystems, covering designated sites, rational use, and regional cooperation across tropical coastal states.

The Standing Committee report SC65 Doc.9 on Regional Initiatives for 2024 to 2025, prepared ahead of COP15, documented the activities of all 22 RRIs over the 2023 to 2025 triennium. Several initiatives reported increased engagement with coastal infrastructure authorities, reflecting the growing recognition within the Convention that shipping-related pressures are among the most spatially concentrated threats to coastal Ramsar Sites in developing regions.

Interaction with Shipping Regulation

The Ramsar Convention is not an IMO instrument and does not directly regulate vessels. Its effect on shipping is indirect but practical: it shapes the permissions that port states and coastal states issue for port development, channel maintenance dredging, and spoil disposal, which in turn affects shipping costs, draught limitations, and port availability.

The key interactions are as follows.

Port expansion and land reclamation. Any port development in or adjacent to a designated Ramsar Site requires the host government to assess whether the project will change the site’s ecological character. If it will, Article 3.2 requires notification to the Secretariat “without delay.” The Secretariat cannot veto the development, but the notification becomes a public record that can be used by civil society organisations in domestic legal challenges. Several major port expansion projects have been delayed or redesigned after Article 3.2 notifications drew international attention.

Dredging and spoil disposal. Capital dredging for port deepening increases turbidity, destroys benthic habitat, and can release contaminants from sediment. Even if the dredge footprint lies outside a Ramsar Site boundary, the turbidity plume may cross the boundary. Under the Convention’s ecological character doctrine, this is a change in ecological character even if the physical disturbance is external. Maintenance dredging cycles in estuaries can prevent the reestablishment of saltmarsh and mangrove on accreting tidal flats.

Ballast water and invasive species. The Ballast Water Management Convention (adopted 2004, entered force 2017) addresses the vector function of ship ballast water for aquatic invasive species. Many Ramsar Sites in estuaries and coastal lagoons have been colonized by invasive species introduced via ballast water. The two conventions operate independently, but national authorities with obligations under both instruments must coordinate their monitoring and enforcement. For more detail on the ballast water regulatory framework see the article on the Ballast Water Management Convention.

Oil pollution. An oil spill affecting a Ramsar Site triggers Article 3.2 notification obligations for the affected party. MARPOL Annex I establishes the primary international framework for oil-pollution prevention at sea; the companion article on MARPOL Annex I covers the discharge standards and special areas relevant to coastal zone protection.

Particularly Sensitive Sea Areas. The IMO’s PSSA designation system (established under MEPC resolution A.927(22)) has been used alongside Ramsar designations to create layered protection for sensitive coastal areas. The Great Barrier Reef is both a Ramsar Site (multiple component sites), a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and a PSSA. The Wadden Sea is a Ramsar Site, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, and a PSSA. This overlap is not coincidental: coastal states seeking IMO PSSA designation often cite existing Ramsar Status as evidence of internationally recognized ecological sensitivity, one of the required criteria. See the article on PSSAs for the IMO procedural framework.

Vessel noise and disturbance. The Convention’s ecological character concept includes ecosystem processes such as bird breeding success and waterfowl feeding behavior. Vessel noise and wake disturbance at designated sites containing waterbird-breeding colonies or feeding areas can in principle constitute a change in ecological character, though no Article 3.2 notification on these grounds has been formally registered. This is an emerging area of convention practice.

Dumping at sea. The London Convention 1972 and London Protocol 1996 govern the dumping of dredge spoil and other materials at sea. Where spoil is dumped in or near a Ramsar Site, both instruments can apply simultaneously. See the London Convention and Protocol article for the permit system and prohibited substances list.

Interaction with Other Environmental Conventions

The Ramsar Convention sits within the broader architecture of multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) and has formal cooperative relationships with six conventions through the Liaison Group of Biodiversity-related Conventions (BLG).

Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). The CBD adopted the Ramsar Convention as its lead implementation partner on wetland issues. Joint work plans have operated continuously since 2000 to 2001. The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework adopted at CBD COP15 in December 2022 set Target 2 (restore 30% of degraded ecosystems by 2030) and Target 3 (protect 30% of land and sea areas by 2030, the “30x30” target). Implementation of these targets for aquatic and coastal ecosystems runs substantially through the Ramsar Site designation and management system.

UNESCO World Heritage Convention. Many Ramsar Sites are also inscribed World Heritage Sites. The Sundarbans (Bangladesh and India), the Everglades (USA), the Danube Delta (Romania), and the Getbol Korean Tidal Flat are among the sites carrying both designations. The two conventions use different criteria and governance structures but share UNESCO as a common institutional relationship, since UNESCO is also the depositary for the Ramsar Convention.

Convention on Migratory Species (CMS). Wetlands designated under the Ramsar Convention include a high proportion of the staging and wintering habitat used by species covered by CMS and its flyway agreements (Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds, AEWA; East Asian-Australasian Flyway Partnership). The COP15 resolution at Victoria Falls in July 2025 endorsed the Global Waterbird Estimates Partnership specifically to strengthen the monitoring foundation shared by Ramsar and CMS.

CITES. The Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species covers many waterbird and aquatic species that depend on Ramsar Sites. Appendix I and II listings under CITES often trigger additional protective attention for the wetland habitats of those species.

UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Wetlands, particularly peatlands and coastal wetlands, are major carbon stores. Peatlands cover 3% of the earth’s land surface but hold roughly 30% of all soil carbon. Mangroves and saltmarshes sequester carbon at rates five to ten times higher per unit area than tropical forests. Several Parties are counting wetland conservation and restoration under their Nationally Determined Contributions. COP15 resolutions in 2025 explicitly linked Ramsar implementation to UNFCCC Paris Agreement obligations.

Russia’s Withdrawal and the Current Membership Count

Russia’s denunciation of the Convention became effective on 21 December 2025. Russia had been a contracting party from 11 February 1977, and held 35 Ramsar Sites including several of global ecological significance in Siberia and the Russian Far East. The State Duma approved the withdrawal law in October 2025, citing “extreme politicization of the Convention.” Russia’s sites remain on the List until formally removed; their management status is now governed solely by Russian domestic law.

Saudi Arabia joined the Convention at or around COP15 in July 2025. The annotated contracting parties list dated 21 December 2025 reflects these changes. The net membership as of that date is 172 contracting parties, though the precise number depends on whether Saudi Arabia’s formal accession preceded Russia’s denunciation taking effect.

The Russia withdrawal is the only full denunciation in the Convention’s 54-year history. No previous party has left. The Article 22 denunciation clause allows a party to withdraw on 12 months’ notice. Russia’s notice period ran from 21 December 2024 to 21 December 2025.

World Wetlands Day

World Wetlands Day falls on 2 February each year, the anniversary of the Convention’s adoption. The first formal celebration in 1997 reached 50 nations. The UN General Assembly elevated the observance to formal UN status through Resolution 75/317, adopted in 2021. Each year’s celebration carries a theme selected by the Secretariat; the day is used for public education, new site designations, and national wetland policy announcements.

The date’s significance extends beyond the anniversary. Celebrating it on 2 February means the event falls in the northern hemisphere winter, when many migratory waterbirds are present on their southern wintering grounds, making field counts and public wetland visits practical in temperate regions where much of the Convention’s political support base lies.

Limitations

Several structural constraints limit the Convention’s effectiveness, and practitioners working in the coastal zone need to understand them.

No veto over development. The Ramsar Convention does not give the Secretariat or the COP the authority to halt development activities in or near a listed site. Article 3.2 notification is an information obligation, not a permit requirement. A government that receives strong domestic or investor pressure to expand a port in a Ramsar Site can proceed after notification, absorbing the international criticism. This contrasts with the World Heritage Convention, which has stronger (though still non-binding) political mechanisms for scrutinizing development in or near inscribed sites.

Self-reporting dependency. The Montreux Record and the Article 3.2 notification system depend on parties self-reporting adverse changes. Under-reporting is systematic. Slow, incremental degradation from maintenance dredging, water diversion, or groundwater extraction rarely triggers a single identifiable “change event.” The 46 sites on the Montreux Record in 2025 almost certainly understates the number of designated sites experiencing significant ecological deterioration.

Uneven management capacity. Designation creates an obligation to manage, but not the resources to do so. Many Ramsar Sites in lower-income countries have information sheets that are 20 or more years out of date. Without current baseline ecological character data, it is difficult to establish what constitutes a “change” for Article 3.2 purposes or to demonstrate that a Montreux-listed site has recovered sufficiently for removal.

Criterion updating lag. The nine designation criteria have been essentially unchanged since 1982. The quantitative thresholds for waterbirds (20,000 individuals under Criterion 5; 1% of a flyway population under Criterion 6) were set from the population data available in the early 1980s. A 2022 study in Conservation Letters examined whether 50-year-old criteria still identify the most important sites for conservation; the authors found mismatches between current population data and site designations that the criteria, as currently applied, do not correct. The STRP has the mandate to review and recommend revisions, but COP adoption of criteria changes is politically slow.

Coastal and marine coverage gaps. Coral reefs, seagrass beds, and subtidal zones within the six-metre depth contour are legally within the Convention’s definition of wetland, but they are poorly represented in the Ramsar Site network compared to freshwater and intertidal sites. Marine and coastal sites that are subject to significant shipping traffic are especially underrepresented. This gap matters for the shipping sector because the Convention cannot supply its protective framework to coastal marine habitats that have not been designated.

No financial mechanism. The Ramsar Convention has no Global Environment Facility window analogous to the CBD’s biodiversity financing mechanism. The CHF 15.5 million triennium budget covers only Secretariat and meeting costs. Ramsar’s implementation relies on national governments, the GEF’s biodiversity focal area (which accepts Ramsar-aligned projects), and bilateral aid, creating financing gaps that disproportionately affect the parties with the most biodiverse and threatened wetlands.

Interaction complexity with port regulatory frameworks. The Convention applies at the national designation level, while port development permits are issued under national or sub-national law, and vessel operations are governed by flag-state jurisdiction under the IMO framework. No single regulatory body coordinates all three. A maritime operator whose vessel operations contribute to degradation of a Ramsar Site through anchor damage, turbidity from propeller wash, or ballast water discharge faces different regulators for each instrument with no unified enforcement body.

Practical Guidance for Shipping and Port Operators

Port planners whose projects are adjacent to or within Ramsar Sites should obtain the relevant information sheet from the Secretariat’s searchable database at ramsar.org to confirm site boundaries and the ecological character description at the time of designation. The information sheet identifies which designation criteria apply, the species and habitats the site was listed to protect, and any recorded changes to ecological character. This document is the foundation for any EIA that must address Ramsar obligations.

Channel-deepening proposals should commission pre-dredge benthic and waterbird surveys to establish current baseline conditions against the designation-era ecological character description. Divergence between the two establishes whether an Article 3.2 notification may already be required before the project begins. Post-dredge monitoring plans should include sediment turbidity monitoring at the site boundary and waterbird counts at intervals aligned with Criterion 5 and 6 population assessment periods.

Vessels operating in or near designated coastal and estuarine Ramsar Sites should consult the applicable PSSA routing measures where PSSAs overlap with the site, because the IMO-adopted protective measures for the PSSA may include area-to-be-avoided (ATBA) designations, recommended routes, or mandatory reporting requirements. See the PSSA overview article for how these measures are adopted and applied.

Anti-fouling systems and hull coatings are relevant where biocide leaching can affect Ramsar Site water chemistry. The AFS Convention 2001 banned organotin tributyltin (TBT) compounds that were responsible for severe imposex in gastropods in estuarine Ramsar Sites across Europe and the Pacific. The AFS Convention article covers current hull coating requirements.

Oil spill contingency planning for terminals adjacent to Ramsar Sites should address the specific ecological character values of the designated site, since a spill affecting a Ramsar Site will trigger Article 3.2 notification obligations on the host state and may attract international scrutiny under the Montreux Record mechanism. SOPEP and SMPEP requirements under MARPOL Annex I apply to the vessel; the land-side contingency framework typically incorporates the Ramsar Site values through the national Oil Pollution Emergency Plan required under OPRC 1990.

See Also

• PSSA Overview for IMO Particularly Sensitive Sea Area designation and its relationship to coastal marine habitats
• MARPOL Annex I for oil pollution prevention in coastal and estuarine areas
• Ballast Water Management Convention for the invasive-species vector addressed by ballast water exchange and treatment
• London Convention 1972 and Protocol 1996 for sea dumping of dredge spoil adjacent to Ramsar Sites
• AFS Convention 2001 for anti-fouling system requirements that protect estuarine and coastal wetland chemistry
• Nairobi Convention 1985 for the regional seas agreement covering the Western Indian Ocean, where many coastal Ramsar Sites are located