About the Reserve:
- UNESCO designated Mura-Drava-Danube (MDD) as the world’s first ‘five-country biosphere reserve.
- It stretches across Austria, Slovenia, Croatia, Hungary and Serbia.
- The total area of the reserve — a million hectares — in the so-called ‘Amazon of Europe’, makes it the largest riverine protected area on the continent.
Rivers-The biosphere reserve covers 700 kilometres of the Mura, Drava and Danube rivers.
Fauna:
- It is home to continental Europe’s highest density of breeding white-tailed eagle, as well as endangered species such as the little tern, black stork, otters, beavers and sturgeons.
- it is also an important annual resting and feeding place for more than 250,000 migratory birds, according to WWF.
Significance of the reserve:
- The reserve is inhabited by almost 900,000 people.
- It is home to floodplain forests, gravel and sand banks, river islands, oxbows and meadows.
- The biosphere “represented an important contribution to the European Green Deal (climate action plan) and contributed to the implementation of the EU Biodiversity Strategy in the Mura-Drava-Danube region.”
- The strategy’s aim is to revitalise 25,000 km of rivers and protect 30% of the European Union’s land area by 2030.
