The month-long campaign includes banners along main streets in Hanoi, demonstrations by bicyclists, and documentary films on television.
The program is being implemented under the Sea Turtle Protection
project sponsored by the Danish International Development Agency in
Vietnam. The project was launched in 2004.
There are seven species of sea turtles in the world, five of which can be found in Vietnamese waters.
All seven species have been labeled “endangered” or “critically endangered” by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) on its Red List of Threatened Species.
Vietnamese have long caught sea turtles for their meat, eggs, shells and skins without knowing of the animal’s small numbers, local newspaper Quan Doi Nhan Dan (People’s Army) reported recently.
Agencies under the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development have organized the campaign in collaboration with the wildlife trade monitoring network TRAFFIC.
