MEDIA RELEASE PR41984
LOST! AMPHIBIANS OF INDIA: New Campaign Launched Through Partnership with University of Delhi
NEW DELHI, Nov. 2, 2010 /PRNewswire-AsiaNet/ --
The University of Delhi along with Global Wildlife Conservation, the Natural History Museum (London), the
IUCN/SSC Amphibian Specialist Group, the Wildlife Conservation Society, and Conservation International
announced today an exciting new partnership to search for long lost amphibian species in India. The details of the
new campaign, called LOST! AMPHIBIANS of INDIA (LAI), was revealed to the world through the Internet
declaration of global support to follow asking individuals to sign on to the mission to find and protect these
threatened and near-extinct species.
"Now is the time to act and show our support for these species of India before they shift from lost to extinct," said
Conservation International's President, Dr. Russell Mittermeier.
On November 2, 2010, the Minister of Environment, Shri. Jairam Ramesh, and other top officials from India's
environmental agencies will meet with LAI partners to plan the actions necessary for India's most imperiled
amphibians. This meeting and subsequent actions have already received funding from Indian government
agencies, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund, and others. However,
greater investment will be critical to the creation of a network of new protected areas.
India has more lost amphibian species, 48 in total, than any other country in the world. Most of these species
have not been seen by scientists for decades, with some missing for over 150 years. The majority of these species
are known only by a single preserved specimen in a jar at either the Natural History Museum in London or the
Zoological Survey of India. Worse yet, at least 17 lost species exist in name only, having been lost over the past
century.
LOST! AMPHIBIANS of INDIA aims to change this by organizing top teams of researchers from India and around
the world to explore India's remaining wilderness areas, in order to relocate existing populations of these
amphibians and assess their conservation requirements. Many of the sites are remote and present the hazards of
rugged terrain and monsoon rains. However if the effort to find them is not made now, their habitats may be lost
before appropriate conservation actions can be implemented. Only 1.5% of the original forests remain in the
Western Ghats and several species are already thought to be extinct; many other parts of the country have even
worse habitat loss.
"Amphibians are popularly known as environmental barometers. They indicate the state of environmental health.
Hence any information about their conservation is extremely vital not only from an amphibian research point of view
but also from the perspective of overall nature conservation," explains Delhi University Associate Professor Dr S.
D. Biju, who is organizing the LAI project.
In preparation for finding species in need of swift conservation action, LOST! AMPHIBIANS of INDIA is
simultaneously initiating discussions to develop the Western Ghats Network of Protected Areas for Threatened
communities who depend on forests for the provision of freshwater, erosion control, and sources of livelihood. The
LOST! AMPHIBIANS of INDIA campaign is therefore not only a last chance to save some of the planet's most
endangered wildlife, but it will also focus attention on remote, rural communities in India and how they depend on
the integrity of the environment for its provision of natural resources.
Saving lost amphibians will impact more than just the species that are the targets of exploration, but also entire
unique ecosystems and the people that depend on them. But to save them, first we have to find them. The quest
has begun.
# # #
The University of Delhi is a premier university of India and is known for its high standards in teaching and
research. The Vice President of India is the University's Chancellor. The Systematics Lab is a unit of the
Department of Environmental Biology and contributes to conservation of amphibians through discovery and
documentation of species.
Global Wildlife Conservation improves life on Earth by advancing both academic and applied approaches to
conservation research, action, and education. Along with its numerous strategic worldwide partners, GWC is
pursuing a common goal: to save plants and animals from extinction and better understand and maintain the
natural world and its biological diversity.
The mission of the Natural History Museum (London) is to maintain and develop its collections and use them to
promote the discovery, understanding, responsible use and enjoyment of the natural world.
SOURCE: Global Wildlife Conservation
CONTACT: J. Tayloe Emery,
+1-310-844-6802,
Tayloe.Emery@gmail.com
NOTE TO EDITORS: For interview requests please contact: S.D. Biju Mobile: (0091) 9871933622 Office:
(0091) 11 27662365 Email: wnpata.project@gmail.com or lostamphibians@gmail.com
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