Wetlands conservation passed a major milestone recently when Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced that the
North American Wetlands Conservation Act (NAWCA) program has allocated more than $1 billion in federal grants.
"This is a huge milestone for a program that has conserved more than 25.4 million acres of wetlands and waterfowl habitat across North America," said Dr. Alan Wentz, Ducks Unlimited senior group manager for conservation, communications and marketing. Wentz sits on the North American Wetlands Conservation Council, which helps select projects funded by the program. "Ducks Unlimited is proud to be one of the thousands of partners that have contributed to the success of the program."
In addition to the $1 billion in grants from the federal government, more than $2 billion in matching funds have been put into the more than 1,900 projects on the ground – more than double the federal government's investment in the program. Each dollar allocated to a NAWCA project by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service must be matched by at least $1 from other sources – usually state governments, non-profit groups like Ducks Unlimited and other community groups.