Group photo of the participants (Than De Village) © Nature Conservation Society–Myanmar (NCS)
World Migratory Bird Day (WMBD) is an annual awareness-raising campaign that highlights the conservation needs of migratory birds and their habitats, and the importance of international cooperation, and is now celebrated twice each year—on the second Saturday in May and in October. In 2025, WMBD took place on May 10th and October 11th, under the theme “Shared Spaces: Creating Bird-Friendly Cities and Communities”, encouraging communities to recognise and support coexistence between people and migratory birds.
Through the EAAFP WMBD 2025 Small Grant, the EAAFP Secretariat supported EAAFP Partners, Task Forces, Working Groups, NGOs and collaborators to deliver locally led WMBD activities across the East Asian–Australasian Flyway. Based on the May and October reports currently on hand, celebrations were organised in 10 countries: Bangladesh, China, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Mongolia, Myanmar, the Philippines, the Republic of Korea, and Thailand. Activities covered a wide range of public engagement and conservation actions, including the distribution of education materials, school and university outreach, guided birdwatching and habitat walks, citizen-science bird counts, community clean-ups, seminars and workshops on bird-friendly cities, creative competitions and exhibitions, and social media initiatives to amplify the WMBD message.
Bangladesh
WMBD 2025 was celebrated through a set of youth-led initiatives linking campuses, local communities and online audiences. On May 18–19, Sylhet Agricultural University and partners engaged 642 participants through a field visit, awareness-raising activities and creative competitions highlighting the importance of conserving migratory birds and their habitats. A nationwide digital campaign led by Kichir-Michir launched on May 10, followed by a five-day online youth contest (May 10–14) featuring poster design, artwork and bird-call imitation challenges to spark wider interest in urban biodiversity. Later in the year, Noakhali Science and Technology University hosted a WMBD Celebration and Environmental Awareness Campaign on October 18, combining a campus birdwatching walk with tree planting and a nature photography and art competition to encourage practical, bird-friendly actions. Together, these activities showed how universities and youth networks can turn awareness into visible community stewardship—both on the ground and online.
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Sylhet Agricultural University
China
Beijing Forestry University marked WMBD with a campus programme that blended outdoor observation with creative learning and public outreach. Primary school pupils joined a guided birdwatching walk around the campus and small lake, practising safe binocular use and basic bird identification, before taking part in a “Birds and Environment” drawing activity and a short bird-ID quiz. A “Birds and Humans” photo exhibition ran throughout the day outside the university’s history hall, using bird images and short stories to spark conversation with students, parents and other visitors about bird-friendly communities.
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©Beijing Forestry University, Faysal Ahmad
Mongolia
The Mongolian Bird Conservation Center introduced WMBD to underserved rural communities through school-based learning and field observation, alongside activities in the capital. Students took part in nest monitoring and contributed bird records via eBird around Chukh Lake and Dashbalbar, linking local learning with flyway-wide citizen science.
Elementary school students of Dashbalbar soum ©Mongolian Bird Conservation Center
Lake bird observation ©Mongolian Bird Conservation Center
Myanmar
On 10–11 May, Nature Conservation Society–Myanmar (NCS) worked with local communities to introduce WMBD. The sessions combined short presentations with interactive quizzes and community discussion, and were supported by simple appreciation gifts and shared meals to keep the programme inclusive. A second round of outreach was delivered across six villages in Kun Chan Kone Township (Yangon Region) and Daedaye Township (Ayeyarwady Region), reaching 611 participants. Activities included the “Birds Around Us” icebreaker, talks on wetlands and flyways, a photo/video exhibition, the distribution of Spoon-billed Sandpiper pamphlets, and certificates and small gifts through quiz-based engagement. In addition, a separate activity proposed by BANCA focused on engaging teenagers around Paleik Lake (Mandalay Region) through school-based awareness sessions; the planned wetland visit was cancelled due to rising water levels, so the team shifted to indoor learning and interactive activities.
Local youth sharing knowledge about the flyway network sites
Group photo of the participants (Sar Kyin Basic Education Post Primary School)
Thailand
In Thailand, the Bird Conservation Society of Thailand (BCST) marked WMBD through a mix of nationwide citizen-science participation and simple, replicable actions for bird-friendly communities. On 11 May, Thailand joined the Global Big Day, with participants submitting eBird checklists and documenting hundreds of bird species in a single day. BCST also encouraged families and casual birdwatchers to engage with birds in everyday urban spaces through social media challenges—such as counting birds in public parks, photographing birds in home gardens, and promoting practical actions like setting up “water stations” for birds—amplifying the WMBD theme of shared spaces.
Awareness campaign ©Bird Conservation Society of Thailand
Indonesia
WMBD Small Grant activities in Indonesia combined public outreach, environmental education, and bird-friendly city messaging across several provinces. Activities included awareness talks and seminars, school-based learning programmes, guided birdwatching and simple habitat stewardship actions (such as community litter collection), as well as creative competitions and online engagement to encourage more bird-friendly cities and communities.
A key activity was a school-based WMBD programme led by Universitas Sulawesi Barat in Tandung Village, Polewali Mandar Regency (West Sulawesi). The organisers introduced pupils to the WMBD theme through guided birdwatching and basic bird identification, then linked learning to action by conducting a litter-collection activity around the school environment. Creative elements such as colouring and storytelling were used to reinforce the message in an age-appropriate way, supported by the distribution of Indonesian-language WMBD posters and booklets for wider take-home sharing.
Students of MIS BPI Kampung Baru participating in a schoolyard clean-up activity
Group photo with MIS BPI Kampung Baru students following the birdwatching trip
Republic of Korea
In the Republic of Korea, a youth-led WMBD initiative in Incheon used a simple digital approach to connect people with migratory bird habitats in and around the city. Led by Taeyeong Kim (George Mason University Korea / EAAFP Youth Task Force), the activity invited participants to visit local birding sites—such as parks, wetlands, riversides and coastal mudflats—photograph birds, and share their observations online as part of a migratory bird photo contest. A key output was a publicly accessible digital map of Incheon’s birding places, compiled from participant submissions, designed to help residents recognise and value migratory bird habitats within shared urban and community spaces.
Malaysia
Nature Sustainable Ecosystem Society (NEST), together with University Tun Hussein Onn Malaysia (UTHM), delivered a hands-on environmental education event at Tanjung Piai National Park (Johor) to promote bird-friendly communities. The programme used an Explorace-style challenge with five interactive learning stations—combining physical games with conservation messages about migratory birds and the value of mangrove and mudflat habitats along the flyway—followed by a short quiz and prize-giving to reinforce key takeaways among participants.
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© EAAFP
Philippines
One Pawikan Initiative in the Philippines organised a programme at Las Piñas–Parañaque Wetland Park (Manila) that blended short talks on migratory birds and urban/coastal habitats with an interactive Bird Race. Participants worked in teams to observe, identify and record birds using mobile tools such as Merlin Bird ID and eBird, while also collecting litter through plogging to link birdwatching with immediate habitat care. The day concluded with a coastal clean-up and trash audit, which documented 109.9 kg of marine debris and generated data to support future waste-management and site-protection efforts.
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©Mark David S. De Guzman, One Pawikan Initiative
Japan
Team SPOON marked WMBD through a creative, flyway-wide storytelling campaign centred on the Black-faced Spoonbill. The team invited members and the wider public to submit short video messages reflecting on wetlands, shared spaces and hopes for bird-friendly cities and communities. These messages were edited with multilingual subtitles and released as daily Instagram posts during a dedicated “WMBD Video Message Week”, reaching around 400 viewers and attracting steady engagement. In total, 26 videos were collected and later compiled into a longer screening shown at Team SPOON’s 10th anniversary gathering in Tokyo, bringing the flyway community’s voices together in a simple, member-led event setting.
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Together, the small grant activities turned “Shared Spaces” into action—linking students, birdwatchers, city residents and local communities through learning, stewardship and citizen science, and helping to build stronger support for migratory bird conservation across the East Asian–Australasian Flyway.
To explore the WMBD 2025 Small Grant activities and access all available reports (May and October cycles), visit: https://eaaflyway.org/world-migratory-bird-day-2025/
To view the Successful Applicants and reports for the May cycle, visit: https://eaaflyway.org/wmbd-sg-may-2025/
To view the Successful Applicants and reports for the October cycle, visit: https://eaaflyway.org/wmbd-sg-oct-2025/
About the EAAFP World Migratory Bird Day (WMBD) Small Grant: https://eaaflyway.org/wmbd-small-grant/
