The story so far: The expansive Western Ghats and two national parks in India—Assam’s Manas national park and West Bengal’s Sundarbans national park—have been categorised as being of “significant concern” in the International Union for Conservation of Nature’s (IUCN) list of natural World Heritage sites across Asia.

Why the survey?

The IUCN’s World Heritage Outlook 4 report released earlier this month attributes four biggest threats to the loss of habitats and species in South Asia: climate change, tourism activities, invasive alien species, and roads. The report categorises the natural sites as “good”, “good with some concerns”, “significant concern”, and “critical”.

“Each of these categories not only shows the potential for a site to preserve its values and underlying attributes but

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