Lubango: The director-general of the National Institute for Biodiversity and Conservation Areas (INBAC), Miguel Xavier, on Saturday called for the strengthening of community awareness to conserve and protect migratory birds in Mupa National Park. Mupa was designated a nature reserve in 1938 and upgraded to a national park in 1964 to safeguard the Angolan giraffe subspecies. According to Angola Press News Agency, Xavier stressed the importance of raising awareness about conserving the species. "Our greatest commitment should be to work with the community and discourage the hunting of birds since they play a decisive role in maintaining the ecosystem," he emphasized. He reported that there have been deaths of open-billed storks, the most abundant bird in Mupa National Park, and that a team from the National Institute of Biodiversity will travel to the province in the coming days to raise awareness among the population and discourage the hunting of these storks. Miguel Xavier said that the national picture of migratory birds is good, as the registration capacity will improve. He gave the example of the inauguration of a statue of the red-footed falcon in the province of Huambo this year. This migratory bird is of great environmental and scientific importance and chooses the locality as a resting point every year during its long migratory route. The official also mentioned that this initiative aims to honor and value this species, which travels thousands of kilometers from Europe to Africa. World Migratory Bird Day raises awareness of the need to conserve this type of bird and its habitats, as well as the threats migratory birds face. It was established in 2006 by the Secretariat of the Agreement on the Conservation of African-Eurasian Migratory Waterbirds (AEWA) in collaboration with the Secretariat of the Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species of Wild Animals (CMS).
