A protected zone in the vicinity of Vetren village next to Lake Srebarna has been declared for the conservation of the sturgeon in the River Danube, the WWF has announced. The protected territory Esetrite-Vetren covers an area of over 288 hectares or 404 football pitches.

By order of the Ministry of the Environment, a number of activities harmful to the fish and their habitat will be prohibited, such as dredging and mining for construction aggregates from the river bed, waste disposal or untreated waste water release, hydraulic technical construction and disturbance of the natural hydro-morphological processes.

The main conservation targets in the protected area are fish of the sturgeon family, and their young in particular – the ones that have chosen this section of the river as a resting and feeding site along their hundreds-kilometres-long journey towards the sea. Having survived 200 million years, sturgeons are a critically endangered species.  At present in Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine and Serbia sturgeon fishing on the Danube and in the Black Sea is banned completely.