Wetlands

The Convention on Wetlands which was convened in 1971 in Ramsar, Iran–known as the "Ramsar Convention" is an intergovernmental treaty that embodies the commitments of its member countries to maintain the ecological character of their Wetlands of International Importance and to plan for the "wise use", or sustainable use, of all of the wetlands in their territories.

The Convention on Wetlands came into force for Jordan on 10 May 1977. Jordan presently has one site designated as a Wetland of International Importance, with a surface area of 7,372 hectares. Jordan Ramsar site is the Azraq Oasis and Qa’a, inscribed on the list in July 1990. Azraq is formerly a permanent, spring-fed wetland and extensive (6,127ha) seasonally-flooded mudflat of a large drainage basin. Under natural conditions, the lush oasis supported reed and sedge communities restricted to Azraq Oasis. It is a valuable staging area for migrating birds and serves as an important water supply for local communities, as well as one of the main water sources for the capital city, Amman. Azraq suffers from unsustainable groundwater extraction which led to the almost complete desiccation of the site.

This site has been almost totally destroyed except from very limited part which is manually fed by water to maintain this ecosystem. This destruction was resulted from severe water abstraction that exceeds many fold of its annual recharge. Accordingly, within the last twenty years, at least 50% of the plant biodiversity recorded in 1995 survey has been lost. Among these lost species are very rare and endemic species that do not occur anywhere else in Jordan. A rehabilitation program has been implemented for Azraq since mid-1990s including the establishment of the Azraq Wetland Reserve (around 10% of the Ramsar site) by RSCN in cooperation with the MoEnv, MoWI and international donor agencies such as GEF, World Bank and GIZ