More than a thousand new species have been discovered in the Greater Mekong Region of Southeast Asia in the last decade, according to a World Wild Fund for Nature (WWF) report.
The new species include 519 plants, 279 fish, 88 frogs, 88 spiders, 46 lizards, 22 snakes, 15 mammals, four birds, four turtles, two salamanders and a new species of toad. Stuart Chapman, director of WWF’s Greater Mekong Programme, said that discoveries on this scale are usually found only in the history books, which reinforces the Greater Mekong’s position on the world map of conservation priorities. Among the 1,068 species discovered between 1997 and 2007 were the world’s largest huntsman spider, with a leg span of 30 centimetres, and the hot pink, cyanide-producing “dragon millipede”, according to the First Contact in the Greater Mekong report. The report stressed that economic development and environmental protection must go hand-in-hand to secure local livelihoods and alleviate poverty, and to ensure the survival of the Greater Mekong's astonishing array of species and natural habitats. The Greater Mekong region includes Cambodia, Laos, Myanmar, Thailand, Vietnam and China, the six countries through which the river flows.
