An elephant safari through the Jaldapara Wildlife Sanctuary in West Bengal, India

The Teide National Park in Tenerife (Spain).

A national park is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state declares or owns. Although individual nations designate their own national parks differently (for example, see Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial in the United States^[1]), an international organization, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), and its World Commission on Protected Areas, has defined National Parks as its category II type of protected areas. While ideas for this type of national park had been suggested previously, the United States established the first such one, Yellowstone National Park, in 1872. The largest national park in the world meeting the IUCN definition is the Northeast Greenland National Park, which was established in 1974. According to the IUCN, there were 6,555 national parks worldwide in 2006 that meet its criteria.^[2]

Definitions[link]

Landsat 7 image of Kavir National Park, Iran.

In 1969 the IUCN (International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources) declared a national park to be a relatively large area with particular defining characteristics.^[3] A national park was deemed to be a place

• with one or several ecosystems not materially altered by human exploitation and occupation, where plant and animal species, geomorphological sites and habitats are of special scientific, educative and recreative interest or which contain a natural landscape of great beauty.
• the highest competent authority of the country has taken steps to prevent or eliminate exploitation or occupation as soon as possible in the whole area and to effectively enforce the respect of ecological, geomorphological, or aesthetic features which have led to its establishment.
• visitors are allowed to enter, under special conditions, for inspirational, educative, cultural, and recreative purposes.

In 1971 these criteria were further expanded upon leading to more clear and defined benchmarks to evaluate a national park. These include:

• a minimum size of 1,000 hectares within zones in which protection of nature takes precedence
• statutory legal protection
• a budget and staff sufficient to provide sufficient effective protection
• prohibition of exploitation of natural resources (including the development of dams) qualified by such activities as sport, fishing, the need for management, facilities, etc.

While national parks are generally understood to be administered by national governments (hence the name), in Australia national parks are run by state governments and predate the Federation of Australia.

History[link]

Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada

In 1835, the English poet William Wordsworth described the Lake District as a^[4]

sort of national property, in which every man has a right and interest who has an eye to perceive and a heart to enjoy.

The painter George Catlin, in his travels through the American West, wrote during the 1830s that the Native Americans in the United States might be preserved^[5]

(by some great protecting policy of government) ...in a magnificent park ...A nation's Park, containing man and beast, in all the wild and freshness of their nature's beauty!

The first effort by any government to set aside such protected lands was in the United States, on April 20, 1832, when President Andrew Jackson signed legislation that the 22nd United States Congress had enacted to set aside four sections of land around what is now Hot Springs, Arkansas to protect the natural, thermal springs and adjoining mountainsides for the future disposal of the US government.^[6][7] It was known as the Hot Springs Reservation. However no legal authority was established and federal control of the area was not clearly established until 1877.^[6]

The next effort by any government to set aside such protected lands was, again, in the United States, when President Abraham Lincoln signed an Act of Congress on June 30, 1864, ceding the Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoias (later becoming the Yosemite National Park) to the state of California:^[8]

.... the said State shall accept this grant upon the express conditions that the premises shall be held for public use, resort, and recreation; shall be inalienable for all time; .... — 38th United States Congress, Session 1, 1864

Yosemite Valley, Yosemite National Park, California, USA

In 1872, Yellowstone National Park was established as the world's first truly national park.^[9] When news of the natural wonders of the Yellowstone were first promulgated, the land was part of a federally governed territory. Unlike Yosemite, there was no state government that could assume stewardship of the land, so the federal government took on direct responsibility for the park, the official first national park of the United States. It took the combined effort and interest of conservationists, politicians and especially businesses—namely, the Northern Pacific Railroad, whose route through Montana would greatly benefit by the creation of this new tourist attraction—to ensure the passage of that landmark enabling legislation by the United States Congress to create Yellowstone National Park. Theodore Roosevelt, already an active campaigner and so influential as good stump speakers were highly necessary in the pre-telecommunications era, was highly influential in convincing fellow Republicans and big business to back the bill.

The United States in 1872. When Yellowstone was established, Wyoming, Montana and Idaho were territories, not states. For this reason, the federal government had to assume responsibility for the land, hence the creation of the national park.

American Pulitzer Prize-winning author Wallace Stegner, has written:^[10]

National parks are the best idea we ever had. Absolutely American, absolutely democratic, they reflect us at our best rather than our worst.

Even with the creation of Yellowstone, Yosemite, and nearly 37 other national parks and monuments, another 44 years passed before an agency was created in the United States to administer these units in a comprehensive way — the U.S. National Park Service (NPS). Businessman Stephen Mather and his journalist partner Robert Sterling Yard pushed hardest for the creation of the NPS, writing then-Secretary of the Interior Franklin Knight Lane about such a need and spearheading a large publicity campaign for their movement. Lane invited Mather to come to Washington, DC to work with him to draft and see passage of the National Park Service Organic Act, which the 64th United States Congress enacted and which President Woodrow Wilson signed into law on August 25, 1916. Of the 397 sites managed by the National Park Service of the United States, only 58 carry the designation of National Park.

Grand Prismatic Spring in Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming, USA Yellowstone was the first national park in the world.

Following the idea established in Yellowstone there soon followed parks in other nations. In Australia, the Royal National Park was established just south of Sydney in 1879, becoming the world's second official national park. Rocky Mountain National Park became Canada's first national park in 1885. New Zealand established Tongariro National Park in 1887. In Europe the first national parks were a set of nine parks in Sweden in 1909; Europe has some 359 national parks as of 2010.^{[citation needed]} Africa's first national park was established in 1925 when Albert I of Belgium designated an area of what is now Democratic Republic of Congo centred around the Virunga Mountains as the Albert National Park (since renamed Virunga National Park). In 1973, Mount Kilimanjaro was classified as a National Park and was opened to public access in 1977.^[11] In 1926, the government of South Africa designated Kruger National Park as the nation's first national park. After World War II, national parks were founded all over the world. The Vanoise National Park in the Alps was the first French national park, created in 1963 after public mobilization against a touristic project.

See also[link]

	Environment portal
	Ecology portal
	Earth sciences portal
	Sustainable development portal

References[link]

External links[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: National parks

• Protected Planet – World Database of Protected Areas
• UNESCO — Man and the Biosphere Programme (Biosphere Reserves)
• World Heritage Sites
• A-Z of Areas of Biodiversity Importance: National Parks
• UN Protected Areas database
• EUROPARC Federation — Europe's protected areas
• European National Parks Centre (ENPC)
• National Park of China
• National Parks Worldwide
• Vietnam National Parks
• Pictures of European national parks

Niah Caves

Niah Caves is located within the district of Miri in Sarawak, Malaysia. Part of Niah National Park, the main cave, Niah Great Cave, is located in Gunung Subis and is made up of several voluminous, high-ceilinged chambers. The Great Cave lies in a large limestone block, about a kilometre long in general north to south direction and about half a kilometre wide, that is detached from the main Gunung Subis complex, by a valley between about 150 to 200 meters wide. The main Gunung Subis complex rises to about 394^[1] meters above sea level at its highest point. The whole "Gunung Subis Limestone Complex" lies some 17 kilometres inland from the South China Sea coast and about 65 kilometres south west of the town Miri. It is roughly heart shaped measuring five kilometres from its northern tip to the south and four kilometres across. The Gunung Subis is surrounded by a low countryside with gentle hills from which the small limestone massiv and its smaller detached blocks rise rather appruptly out of the jungle, some with cliffs over 100 metres high.^[2] Though it is not an extensive cave system compared to others in Sarawak, it has been estimated to cover some 10 hectares and the roof rises to about 75 metres above the cave floor in some places.^[3] In geological terms, the limestones are part of the Subis Formation. This is dated to some 20 to 16 million years ago during the Early Miocene.^[2] The caves have been used by humans at different times ranging from the prehistory to neolithic, chinese Sung-Era and more recent times.

The main entrance to the Niah Caves at sunset

The cave is an important prehistorical site where human remains dating to 40,000 years have been found.^[3] This is the oldest recorded human settlement in east Malaysia. More recent studies published in 2006 have shown evidence of the first human activity at the Niah caves from ca. 46,000 to ca. 34,000 years ago.^[4] Painted Cave, situated in a much smaller limestone block of its own, some 150 metres from the Great Cave block's south eastern tip, has rock paintings dated as 1,200 years old. The caves are also well known for the birds' nest (Swiftlet) industry. It is a popular tourist destination in Sarawak. Archeologists have claimed a much earlier date for stone tools found in the Mansuli valley, near Lahad Datu in Sabah, but precise dating analysis has not yet been published.^[5]

Research was pioneered by Tom Harrisson in the 1950/60s.^[6] Since then local universities and foreign scientists have continued the archaeological research, and many articles have been published in the Sarawak Museum Journal. The site has been re-excavated (1999-2003+)^[7] by a joint British-Malaysian expedition to determine the accuracy of Harrisson's work.

Items found at Niah Cave include Pleistocene chopping tools and flakes, Neolithic axes, adzes, pottery, shell jewellery, boats, mats, then iron tools and ceramics and glass beads dating to the Iron Age. The most famous find is the human skull dated at around 38,000 years BCE.^[3][7] Painted Cave has paintings and wooden coffin 'death ships'.

Niah National Park was 31.4 km² when it was gazetted in 1974.^[8]

Nomination for World Heritage status was sent to UNESCO in 2010.

See also[link]

• Prehistoric Malaysia

References[link]

Further reading[link]

• Kennedy, Kenneth A. R., "The Deep Skull of Niah: an Assessment of Twenty Years of Speculation Concerning its Evolutionary Significance", Asian Perspectives, XX(I), 1977

External links[link]

• A short description of the caves as a touristic destination.
• Summary of the article "A short history of birds' nests management in the Niah caves (Sarawak)." by Quentin Gausset from the "Borneo Research Bulletin" published in 2002.
• Another version from the Sarawak Forestry with a map of the caves
• Article with a picture of some paintings and death ships.
• Picture of some cave paintings.

Coordinates: 3°48′50″N 113°46′53″E / 3.81389°N 113.78139°E / 3.81389; 113.78139