Philippe Van Cappellen’s team celebrates World Wetlands Day at University of Waterloo


For the past four years, Canada Excellence Research Chair Philippe Van Cappellen’s Ecohydrology Research Group has hosted a celebration of World Wetlands Day at the University of Waterloo.

World Wetlands Day is an annual international celebration commemorating the signing of the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands on February 2, 1971. Signed by 168 countries, it is one of the most successful and long-lasting global environmental treaties ever ratified, protecting more than 200 million hectares of designated wetlands worldwide.

This year, the group marked the occasion with an afternoon reception and poster session featuring wetlands research, followed by an evening public lecture.

Students and researchers from across the University of Waterloo and Western University presented thirty posters on topics ranging from field and laboratory experiments to understanding how to restore wetlands using economic and market-based tools.

Jos Verhoeven from Utrecht University in the Netherlands delivered the evening distinguished public lecture, entitled “Reclaiming, using, and protecting wetlands: How the Dutch created The Netherlands”. More than 150 people attended the sold-out lecture, which can be seen on Livestream.

Learn more about the World Wetlands Day event at the University of Waterloo

Learn more about World Wetlands Day