Acronym

United4Nature

NUMBER

PBU3/1047/20

Project type

Micro-project

STATUS

Not started

THEMATIC OBJECTIVE

HERITAGE

PRIORITY

1.2 Promotion and preservation of natural heritage

PARTNERSHIP

PL-BY

LEAD BENEFICIARY

Sejny Municipality (Podlaskie Voivodeship, Poland)

BENEFICIARY

Yanka Kupala State University of Grodno (Hrodna Oblast, Belarus)

Project description

The United4Nature project aims at  preservation of natural heritage of two rivers in Polish-Belarusian borderland - Marycha and Czarna Hańcza. Both watercourses flow through many protected areas and are of considerable natural and landscape value but both of them, running also through urban and agricultural zones, are subject to pollution and transformation of their natural landscape.

The protection and improvement of the water quality of these rivers is necessary to revive the tourist potential. On the one hand a research will be carried out to recognize natural values of Marycha and Czarna Hańcza and identify the threats in order to develop effective solutions to them. The elements of this research will be water analyzes during field workshops drawing the attention of the younger generation to the need of the protection of both rivers. A good opportunity to promote the natural heritage of the project area among representatives of both nationalities, which will encourage the cross-border tourism in future and will bring greater number of people visiting natural sites will be the cross-border seminar organized in Belarus for Polish and Belarusian students. On the other hand the project focuses on the promotion of natural heritage among local citizens and cross-border tourists. It is planned to implement wide educational campaign targeted to different groups of recipients, from pre-school children up to adults. It will consist of such elements as a series of educational classes, ecological festival, action of cleaning up the Marycha river on kayaks. Local inhabitants and tourists in the cross-border area will benefit from the raise of tourist attractiveness of the regions through creation of educational path along Marycha river in Sejny with function of a recreation area promoting the need of protection of natural heritage.

The project will bring advantages to both sides of the border. All the activities will play an important role in increasing the number of visitors of the natural sites in the project area.