World Sparrow Day

Today is World Sparrow Day. World Sparrow Day is a day designated to raise awareness of the House Sparrow and other common birds to urban environments, and of threats to their populations, observed on 20th March. It is an international initiative by the Nature Forever Society of India in collaboration with the Eco-Sys Action Foundation (France) and numerous other national and international organizations across the world.

World Sparrow Day also has a broader vision to provide a platform where people who are working on the conservation of the House Sparrow and other common birds can network, collaborate and exchange conservation ideas which will lead to better science and improved results. It aims to provide a meeting ground for people from different parts of the world to come together and form a force that can play an important role in advocacy and in spreading the awareness on the need of conserving common biodiversity or species of lower conservation status.

70cm long stamp from Taiwan

Chunghwa Post is to unveil a new set of stamps today featuring embroidery work from China’s Qing Dynasty collected by the National Museum of History.The state-run postal firm said one of the stamps in the set, which is 70cm in length, shows an entire 5m long traditional cloth embroidered with flower and bird patterns.

It is also the longest stamp the firm has ever issued. The postage value of the 70cm stamp, which is about 20 times the length of a regular stamp, is NT$50.The costs of the stamp sets vary from NT$200 to NT$250, depending on the type.Only 200,000 of the 70cm stamps will be available, it said.

Aside from the long stamps, five normal-sized stamps, as well as a miniature sheet featuring the embroidery collection, is also to be released.

According to Chunghwa Post, a traditional embroidered cloth was mainly used to decorate the main halls of a house to celebrate a wedding or a family members’ birthday.The cloth was about 5m in length and was richly embroidered with patterns of flowers, birds, grasses, trees, clouds and rocks.

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Thanks to Mr Sanjiv Jain and Mr Prashant Pandya for today's Post.