In October, the French Ministry of Ecology, Sustainable Development, and Energy (MEDDE) published the results of a survey of expert opinions concerning the state of wetlands in metropolitan France and its overseas territories in 2010, as well as how they evolved between 2000 and 2010 (download the report here opposite).
It shows that the overall situation of these ecosystems, which are of major ecological interest, deteriorated significantly over the period studied. In fact, the condition of 48% of wetlands deteriorated, whereas only 11% showed improvement. In addition, it should be noted that this negative trend is mainly the consequence of the qualitative degradation of wetlands due to phenomena such as urbanisation, drainage, exceptional climate events, and the proliferation of invasive species, rather than a decrease in their surface area, and that, on the whole, coastal wetlands resisted better than continental ones. On the positive side, there has been an improvement in how wetlands are perceived, which has resulted in better management and conservation programmes.
The Tour du Valat participated directly in this survey by supplying data for the Camargue, which was one of the 152 wetlands studied. The conclusions concerning the Camargue indicate an overall stabilisation in its ecological condition, with no clear trend during the 2000-2010 period, due to negative factors such as coastal erosion, the spreading of invasive species, and the appearance of new pollutants, which were counterbalanced by positive factors such as the spreading of certain heritage species, and the restoration of areas that had been drained.
The conclusions of this survey coincide with those of a UNEP report conducted within the framework of the TEEB (The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity) research project, and made public on 16 October, 2012 at the 11th Conference of Parties to the Convention for Biological Diversity in India, which warned about the very serious threats facing wetlands worldwide. Indeed, half of the total surface area of wetlands disappeared between 1900 and 2003, due to six principal factors: runaway urbanisation worldwide during the last century, overfishing, the massive development of agricultural irrigation, the increasing use of pesticides and phenomena linked to the resulting eutrophication, climate change, and the development of industry, particularly in the extractive sector. This observation is very alarming because wetlands provide essential services to humanity, as much in terms of biodiversity as food security, as well as in limiting the impact of climate change. Therefore, the report incites us to put wetlands at the heart of public policy, to better assess the services they provide, and to integrate the relationships between these ecosystems and the people who depend on them (download the report here opposite).