<div dir="ltr"><div dir="ltr"><div><div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><font face="arial, sans-serif" style="" color="#000000">Dear all,</font></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000"><br></font></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000">As well as running the UK-based Pasture for Life, I am a trustee of the <a href="https://www.wildcamels.com/">Wild Camel Protection Foundation</a> (WCPF) that seeks to safeguard and restore the very small populations of wild bactrian camel in the Chinese and Mongolian Gobi deserts. The species is the 8th most critically endangered mammal in the world and conservation efforts are building pace, albeit slowly, and the charity runs two captive breeding centres in the Mongolian Gobi.</font></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000"><br></font></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><div style=""><span style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:0px;text-decoration:none;float:none;background-color:rgb(255,255,255);display:inline!important"><font color="#000000" style="" face="arial, sans-serif">The wild camel is a separate species from the domesticated Bactrian camel. The Veterinary University in Vienna discovered the distinctness of the wild camel through genetic testing. Wild camels have adapted to drink salt water with a higher salt content than seawater. Scientists still don’t know how the wild camel can absorb and secrete the salt water; domestic Bactrian camels cannot do the same.</font></span></div></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000"><br></font></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000">As you can see from the letter attached, the WCPF is very worried about the proposed imposition of a new border crossing between China and Mongolia, and 220km of associated road, in the Great Gobi Special Protected Area A, the area in which the wild bactrian camel are relatively protected in Mongolia. </font>The new road will inevitably bring hunters, mineral prospectors and other incursions that elsewhere have destroyed ecosystems and decimated wild camel herds.</div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><br></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000">The charity and its zoo/academic partners are writing to the Mongolian government to try and change their approach but it all happened suddenly and implementation looks to be imminent. </font></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000"><br></font></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><span><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000">This current year is actually the International Year of the Camelid, as many of you will know, but as regards to rangelands and pastoralists and IYRP 2026, the Gobi steppe where the wild camel and many other herbivores graze and survive would, in my view, represent an area that would fall under the definition of IYRP and merit our attention here.</font></span></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><span><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000"><br></font></span></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><span><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000">If anyone has any familiarity with these issues, has any bright ideas about people to get this in front of, all with the aim of raising awareness and potentially stopping the Mongolian and Chinese governments from continuing with their plan, then please let me know. UNESCO is some way along creating the GGSPAA as a World Heritage Site, which may offer some protection, but it's not finalised yet. In any event, more protections are needed.</font></span></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><span><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000"><br></font></span></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><span><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000">With best wishes,</font></span></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><span><font face="arial, sans-serif" color="#000000"><br></font></span></div><div dir="auto" style="font-style:normal;font-weight:400;letter-spacing:normal;text-indent:0px;text-transform:none;white-space:normal;word-spacing:1px;text-decoration:none;background-color:rgba(0,0,0,0);border-color:rgb(49,49,49)"><font face="arial, sans-serif" style="" color="#000000">Jimmy Woodrow</font></div></div></div></div><div><br></div><span class="gmail_signature_prefix">-- </span><br><div dir="ltr" class="gmail_signature" data-smartmail="gmail_signature"><div dir="ltr"><table width="100%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" align="left" style="clear:both;border-bottom:1px solid rgb(229,229,229);font-family:Roboto,Verdana,Arial,sans-serif"><tbody><tr><td align="left" valign="bottom" height="45"><font style="font-family:"Roboto Condensed",Verdana,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;line-height:16px;color:rgb(55,107,41)"><span style="font-weight:bold">Jimmy Woodrow</span> | <span style="color:rgb(102,155,52)">Executive Director</span></font></td></tr><tr><td align="left" valign="bottom" height="20"><font style="font-family:Roboto,Verdana,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;line-height:18px;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-weight:bold;color:rgb(174,77,152)">e:</span> <a href="mailto:firstnamelastname@pastureforlife.org" style="color:rgb(0,0,0);border:none;outline:none;display:inline;text-decoration:unset!important" target="_blank"><span style="text-decoration:unset!important">jimmy@pastureforlife.org</span></a><br></font></td></tr><tr><td align="left" valign="bottom" height="20"><font style="font-family:Roboto,Verdana,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;line-height:18px;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><span style="font-weight:bold;color:rgb(174,77,152)">t:</span> <a href="tel:+44+(0)+1234+567+891" style="color:rgb(0,0,0);border:none;outline:none;display:inline;text-decoration:unset!important" target="_blank">+44 (0) 7</a>766 572 468<br></font></td></tr><tr><td height="15"></td></tr><tr><td align="left" valign="middle" style="border-top:1px solid rgb(229,229,229)"><table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"><tbody><tr><td align="left" valign="bottom" height="30"><font style="font-family:Roboto,Verdana,Arial,sans-serif;font-size:14px;line-height:18px;color:rgb(0,0,0)"><a href="https://www.pastureforlife.org/" style="font-family:"Roboto Condensed",Verdana,Arial,sans-serif;font-weight:bold;color:rgb(174,77,152);border:none;outline:none;display:inline;text-decoration:unset!important" target="_blank">pastureforlife.org</a><br></font></td></tr><tr><td height="8"></td></tr><tr><td valign="top" align="left"><table border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"><tbody><tr><td align="left" valign="bottom" height="51"><a href="htt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