Despite the dangers of travelling to a war-torn country, for the past several years Canadian Chris Shank has been spending a third of his time in Afghanistan.

But Shank's work has little to do with NATO's mission in the mountainous Central-Asian state. A wildlife biologist based in Cochrane, Alta., he took a post at a non-profit group called the Wildlife Conservation Society in 2006, to help establish protected areas in Afghanistan.

Earlier this year his efforts paid off, when the Afghan government created the country's first national park, called Band-e-Amir, which lies 240 kilometres west of Kabul.

"The landscape is incredibly beautiful," Shank told Canada AM on Friday. The park's six lakes, located on a plateau 3,000 meters above sea level, are bright blue and surrounded by red limestone cliffs, he said.

Shank first got the idea to create a conservation area there in the 1970s, while he was working for the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. He created a management plan at the time, which became the basis for the park's creation three decades later.

The area was in relatively good shape during Shank's initial trips. But Russia invaded Afghanistan in 1979, and the country has been in varying states of war for much of the time since then. That fighting has taken its toll.

"Prior to the war, people didn't have much in the way of modern firearms," Shank said. "But now, firearms are very prevalent and just opportunistic hunting has really decimated some of the large animals in the area."

"The habitat is very heavily affected."

Snow leopards have disappeared from the area, according to the conservation society. But it's still home to wild goats called ibexes, a type of wild sheep called urials, foxes, fish and birds, the group says.

"If we do protect the habitat, we expect that some of these species will come back in larger numbers," Shank said. "The bird populations are doing fairly well. Hunting has basically stopped for water fowl."

About 5,000 people live inside the park's borders. It houses 13 villages and covers about 575 square kilometers. A committee made up of local residents provides input into how the park is managed.

Shank's organization conducted wildlife surveys, outlined the park's boundaries and helped the local government develop a management plan, including creating new laws.

The project was made possible thanks to a grant of $1 million from the U.S. government.

More than 80 per cent of Afghans depend on the country's natural resources to get by, the conservation society says. That makes efforts to preserve wildlife crucial to the country's economic and political stability.

The province's female governor also lobbied hard to set up the park, seeing it as a way to create local jobs and help the economy.

Afghan authorities also applied to have Band-e-Amir recognized as a UNESCO World Heritage site in 2004, which would provide the area with more resources to protect its habitat and wildlife.

The country's environmental protection agency also released its first list of protected species in June. That list includes 33 animals such as the snow leopard, the Asiatic black bear and the Marco Polo sheep.

The Wildlife Conservation Society is hoping Band-e-Amir will become one among a number of parks and protected areas it plans to help establish throughout Central Asia, in areas near Pakistan, China and Tajikistan.