Promulgation of a Declaration of Rights for Wetlands to improve their conservation and management has superficial attraction. However, difficulties with defining what a wetland is and confusing human rights with ecosystem rights suggest there are more problems than opportunities inherent in such a Declaration. Involving Indigenous and local knowledge in the discussion without a clear vision for access to and use of that knowledge also has problems. A better solution to stemming the tide of wetland loss is to rethink the problem in terms of landscape stewardship and to use the existing governance and legislative systems, especially the Convention on Biological Diversity’s Ecosystem Approach in tandem with the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands (Iran, 1971), more effectively.

颁布湿地权利宣言以改善其保护和管理具有表面吸引力。然而，定义湿地是什么以及将人权与生态系统权利相混淆的困难表明，此类宣言中存在的问题多于机遇。在没有明确获取和使用知识的愿景的情况下，让土著和地方知识参与讨论也存在问题。阻止湿地丧失浪潮的一个更好的解决方案是重新考虑景观管理方面的问题，并使用现有的治理和立法体系，特别是与拉姆萨尔湿地公约（伊朗，1971 年，1971 )，更有效。