Do 50‐year‐old Ramsar criteria still do the best possible job? A plea for broadened scientific underpinning of the global protection of wetlands and migratory waterbirds

With its focus on wetlands, the Ramsar Convention provides the clearest globalagreement helping the conservation of migratory waterbirds. Two specific criteria (5 and 6) support the scientific basis for sites to achieve Ramsar recognitionbased on waterbird counts, while criterion 4, on species and ecological communities, also plays a role. Other international conventions and agreements followthese criteria. We identify several reasons why the listing thus established canonly “catch” the absolute minimum wetland network for the conservation ofmigratory waterbirds. We argue that individual tracking and modern observational tools allow to better delineate the areas needed to effectively give migratorywaterbird populations full life cycle protection. The sophisticated techniques tomeasure population characteristics now available should be used to modernizethe guidance for the application of Criteria 4 and 6 of the Ramsar Conventionfor waterbirds, based on (i) time spent in a site throughout migration; (ii) critical (“untouchable”) sites; (iii) robustness of designated site network includingbuffer areas; (iv) full life cycle information—including early life phases; and(v) refuges used on-and-off during migration in emergency situations. In theseenhanced ways, migratory waterbirds can enact their roles as effective sentinelsof the ecological state of the world.