Conservation brings biodiverse cave from darkness

A vast cavern rediscovered in 2008 helped transformed Vietnam’s Phong Nha–Kẻ Bàng National Park from an ecosystem impacted by poaching and logging into a thriving hub of sustainable tourism, a rare success story.

“There was no work,” remembered Phan Văn Thín, who as a teenager supported himself through jungle work despite the decline of many species at the time. As UNESCO recognition expanded and conservation enforcement tightened, hundreds of former hunters traded their hunting equipment for helmets and harnesses, finding steady work guiding visitors through the region’s 400-million-year-old karst labyrinth.

Fifteen years later, wild species began reappearing in growing numbers. Elusive animals like the saola (Pseudoryx nghetinhensis), an antelope so rarely seen that it is nicknamed the “Asian Unicorn,” are now found in Phong Nha–Kẻ Bàng.

National parks in Vietnam have limited resources to measure wildlife population numbers. But UNESCO recently declared a transboundary world heritage site in the area that stretches past the western border and into Laos. Conservationists hope this expansion will increase the benefits of the park, reshaping livelihoods and reviving ecosystems across country boundaries.

Read more in Mongabay.