Conservation of Iranian Wetlands Project (CIWP) is a joint initiative between the Government of Islamic

Republic of Iran (led by the Department of Environment), Global Environmental Facility (GEF) and United

Nations Development Program (UNDP), which started in 2005 and was scheduled to end in April 2013.

But to draw on the recommendations of Terminal Evaluation on sustainability of results for ensuring that

CIWP’s outcomes are systematically up-scaled both vertically and horizontally, a scale-up phase was

approved by Department of Environment and UNDP to continue and fulfil the achievements of CIWP.

Along with this scale up phase a project entitled “Contribution to Restoration of Lake Urmia via Local

Community Participation in Sustainable Agriculture and Biodiversity Conservation” was added to CIWP

in 2014 as a new component with financial support of the government of Japan.