▲ Tidal flat in Boseong [provided by the CHA. NOT FOR SALE]
▲ Black cranes in Suncheon's tidal flat [provided by the CHA. NOT FOR SALE]
▲ Tidal flat in Gochang [provided by the CHA. NOT FOR SALE]

SEOUL, May 11 (Yonhap) -- The South Korean government's bid to inscribe tidal flats on the southwest coast of the Korean Peninsula on the World Heritage List have met a reef, as a preliminary advisory body  recommended "Defer," the third of the four grades.

 

However, the government plans to try to overturn the review at the session of the World Heritage Committee in July.

 

The Cultural Heritage Administration of Korea said on the 11th that the World Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), a world heritage advisory and review organization, recommended "Defer" for 'Getbol, Korean Tidal Flat' in Seocheon, North Jeolla Province, Sinan, South Jeolla Province, and Boseong and Suncheon, South Jeolla Province spanning the southwest coast of the Korean peninsula. 

However, the CHA added, "We will continue to push for enlistment with related organizations based on IUCN's rreviews."
 

World Heritage is divided into cultural and natural heritage, and the International Council on Monuments and Sitess (ICOMOS) and the IUCN will review the candidate heritage applied by each country, respectively. 

 

The two organizations select one of the four recommendations: 'Inscribe', 'Refer', 'Defer' and 'Not to Inscribe' and deliver it to the World Heritage Center and the parties concerned.

Among them, if the "Inscribe" evaluation is received, it is certain that it will be enlisted, but the lower evaluations will be possible only if it attempts to reverse it at the World Heritage Committee session. It is impossible to reapply for inscription that was finally declared "Not to Inscribe" by the World Heritage Committee.

Until now, one of the cases in which Korea has succeeded in inscription without receiving "Inscribe" from the advisory body is "Historic Villages of Korea: Hahoe and Yangdong," which was declared "Refer" in 2010. The "Seowon, Korean Neo-Confucian Academies" was re-applied and inscribed after the "Defer" recommendation, while only four out of seven temples were "recommended to inscribe," and all seven were eventually enlisted.

 

The Korean government insisted that the tidal flats have the outstanding universal value (OUV), which is a prerequisite for becoming a World Heritage site in fact that the species is diverse, endangered species inhabit, and the world's thickest pearl sediments are stably maintained due to topography and climate influence.

In response, the IUCN acknowledged that these tidal flats have the potential as 'the most important and meaningful natural habitat for the preservation of biodiversity' as 2,150 animals and plants live, including 47 endemic species and 5 endangered marine invertebrates.

 

However, it pointed out that the range was not wide enough to represent large-scale topographical and ecological processes except for the Sinan flat, and that the flats did not include key areas in terms of biodiversity. It also added that the buffer zones surrounding the world heritage is insufficient.

Earlier in 2018, the application for inscription was not filed because of the lack of completeness of the paper and the lack of preservation management bodies.

Accordingly, a new inscription document reinforcing these problems was submitted to UNESCO in January 2019 and was evaluated by IUCN until April last year.

The listing was scheduled to be decided last summer, but the announcement was delayed by one year as the World Heritage Committee session was postponed in the wake of the novel coronavirus infection (Corona-19).

Currently, Korea has a total of 14 world heritage sites, and 'Jeju Volcanic Island and Lava Tubes' are the only world natural heritage sites.

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