Some of the most beautiful birds on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast are depicted on a series of four postage stamps, which today, 01.02.2019, at the headquarters of the Bulgarian Post Office EAD, was validated by the President of the Union of Bulgarian Philatelists Spas Panchev and Lyudmila Zimbileva, Department of Postal Services Development at the Ministry of Transport, Information Technology and Communications at the headquarters of the Bulgarian Post Office EAD.
The brief ceremony was also attended by Ina Agafonova, founder of the Via Pontica Foundation, which is the initiator of the branding, Aylin Hasan – chief expert in the National Nature Protection Service and the young artist Natalia Aleksieva, illustrating the brands with 4 of the most beautiful species of waterfowl on the Bulgarian Black Sea coast – Great White Pelican, Eurasian Bittern, Little Egret and Pigmy Cormorant.
The date 01.02.2018 was chosen not by accident. It comes on the eve of World Wetlands Day – 02 February, which day the Via Pontica Foundation will celebrate, apart from the validation of the series of postage stamps, and with three events in Burgas, about which you can find more on the viapontica.org website and on the worldwetlandsday.org.
Wetlands are our future! The main benefits to humans from the normal functioning of wetlands are: climate protection, water use, fishing, agriculture, logging, energy, wildlife, transport, other products, including medicinal plants, recreation and tourism. The motto of celebrating World Wetlands Day this year is: “To raise awareness of the importance of wetlands in climate protection”.
It is not necessary the mankind’s prosperity to be at the expense of the Earth, that is why the Via Pontica Foundation aim to reverse the process of biodiversity loss and the destruction of ecosystems and minimize the strongest negative impacts on the nature in one of the most important and significant for Bulgaria wetlands – the Burgas wetlands. They are also the principal place of activities of the Foundation Via Pontica.
The Burgas Lake Complex is a major crossing point on the Via Pontica migration route – one of the great airways of migratory birds from all over Europe. Here the birds traditionally stop relaxing, and some remain to winter and nest. There are 254 bird species in the lakes region, 71 of which are included in the Red Data Book of Bulgaria. Of the species present, 105 are of European conservation importance, 9 of them are threatened globally and 95 species are endangered in Europe.
With the initiation and release of this set of four postage stamps, the Via Pontica Foundation aims to promote the rich biodiversity we still have, to change people’s attitudes towards protected areas and species so that there will be a clean nature for the generations after us.
And as Ban Ki-moon, the former UN Secretary-General, says: “Although individual decisions may seem small in the face of global threats and trends, when billions of people join forces in common purpose we can make a tremendous difference.”