Arab Emirates: “development” threatens wildlife
Date: 8/8/05 at 12:09PM
Mood: Looking Playing: Money, money, money, by Abba
UMM AL-QUWAIN, United Arab Emirates Aug 6, 2005 [from ABC site] — The Khor al-Beidah lagoon is a pristine tidal flat teeming with wildlife, including endangered birds, sea turtles and manatee-like dugong [see also here] that swim among its tangles of mangroves.
But a bevy of dredges and construction gangs are about to begin transforming a 1,500-acre parcel into a $3.3 billion luxury conglomeration of homes, shops, marinas and beach resorts aimed at foreign buyers and tourists.
The crown jewels of the development are private villas to be built on artificial islands with gated access and views over one of the few remaining mangrove archipelago left in the Persian Gulf.
Developers say the waterfront complex, called Umm Al-Quwain Marina, will skirt the mangroves and leave most of the 20 square miles of wetland untouched.
“Our aim is to create a community of special neighborhoods bordering an open stretch of water with views of the marina against a backdrop of the gulf,” says Mohammed Ali Alabbar, chairman of Emaar, the Middle East’s largest developer.
Environmentalists are aghast.
They fear construction and people, cars and boats will drive off Khor al-Beidah’s internationally famous wildlife, including birds that migrate from Siberia to Africa and the rare Socotra cormorant that nests almost exclusively on the Arabian Peninsula.
“We’ve seen it happen everywhere else.
When you start to dredge and build marinas, that’s the end of it,” says Colin Richardson, a 30-year resident of Dubai and author of the periodic Emirates Bird Report and a guidebook to local species.
Another endangered Dugong found dead in Abu Dhabi: here.
