{"id":36078,"date":"2023-04-04T17:34:39","date_gmt":"2023-04-04T16:34:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newsblogsnew.ihbc.org.uk\/?p=36078"},"modified":"2023-04-04T17:34:39","modified_gmt":"2023-04-04T16:34:39","slug":"british-ecological-society-informs-house-of-lords-inquiry-on-reaching-the-30x30-target-for-protected-areas","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/?p=36078","title":{"rendered":"British Ecological Society informs House of Lords\u2019 inquiry on reaching the 30\u00d730 target for protected areas"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Prof. Rick Stafford and Prof. Jane Hill have summarised the key findings of the British Ecological Society (BES) report on protected areas for the House of Lords\u2019 Environment and Climate Change Committee inquiry into protected areas.<\/h3>\n

image: for illustration – Peter Badcock<\/em><\/h6>\n

<\/p>\n

\u202630\u00d730 target is potentially a great opportunity to ramp up protection for the most valuable of our habitats\u2026<\/span><\/em><\/h2>\n

The British Ecological Society (BES) writes:<\/p>\n

The House of Lords\u2019 Environment and Climate Change Committee has launched\u00a0an inquiry\u00a0into protected areas to explore the current state of protected areas and how effective the various designations are at helping to protect nature.<\/p>\n

In the first\u00a0evidence session, BES Policy Committee Chair Professor Rick Stafford and BES Trustee Professor Jane Hill were brilliant at summarising the key points made in our\u00a0report on protected areas. Rick was the lead Steering Group member of the report and Jane was one of the senior authors.<\/p>\n

In 2019 the UK Government pledged to protect\u00a030% of it sea, and in 2020 it made the same commitment, known as 30\u00d730, for its\u00a0land. 30\u00d730 is also one of the key targets of the\u00a0Global Biodiversity Framework\u00a0agreed at COP15.<\/p>\n

The 30\u00d730 target is potentially a great opportunity to ramp up protection for the most valuable of our habitats. However, we are still far off the target. Statutory protected sites, like for example Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs), Special Areas of Conservation (SACs) and Special Protection Areas (SPAs), which were designed to protect nature, cover only 11% of UK land, and only about half of them are in\u00a0favourable condition.<\/p>\n

Landscape designations like National Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs) cover 17% of UK land. They have great potential to contribute to nature recovery, but, as highlighted by the\u00a0Glover Review, they are not adequately funded, and in general they were not designated to protect nature. A\u00a0study published in 2018\u00a0found that SSSIs outside England\u2019s National Parks and AONBs were more likely to be in favourable condition than those inside.<\/p>\n

On the marine side, 38% of UK seas are formally designated, but bottom trawling is taking place in\u00a0most offshore MPAs\u00a0and many of them do not even have a management plan. The Government\u2019s announcement of bylaws to\u00a0ban bottom trawling\u00a0in 4 out of the 76 UK offshore marine protected areas is a welcome first step, but we urgently need more such initiatives.<\/p>\n

How can we reach the 30\u00d730 target in a meaningful way?<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The network of terrestrial protected areas needs to be completed and connectivity needs to be ensured to make species more resilient, especially against climate change. More Highly Protected Marine Areas (HMPAs) need to be created. The recent designation of\u00a0three HPMAs\u00a0in England points to the right direction, but progress has been\u00a0too little and too slow\u00a0(the original proposal was for a designation of 5 new HMPAs, which would have covered just 0.53% of English seas). The ongoing\u00a0consultation\u00a0on this topic in Scotland suggests a much braver approach, as the objective is to have 10% of Scottish sea covered by HMPAs.<\/li>\n
  2. Environmental protection needs to be strengthened and maintained in the long term. If the protected area system is to be reformed in England, the protection granted to national designations like SSSIs should be\u00a0consistent with or stronger than the protection of EU-derived designations\u00a0like SACs and SPAs.<\/li>\n
  3. Monitoring needs to be improved, which will require more funding and better coordination\/consistency across the four nations.<\/li>\n
  4. Landscape designations do have a great potential to contribute to nature recovery due to their large coverage, existing governance structures, and good relationships with local communities and land managers. Portions of landscape designations could count towards the target in the next few years, if they undergo a transformational change to repurpose them to ensure nature\u2019s recovery and are adequately funded.\u00a0Expanding the amount of high quality semi-natural habitats\u00a0and setting aside some land for nature recovery, as the\u00a0Exmoor National Park\u00a0has already done, will be key.<\/li>\n
  5. Some\u00a0Other Effective Area-based Conservation Measures\u00a0(OECMs), like for example land owned by environmental NGOs, Local Wildlife Sites and National Nature Reserves, could potentially contribute to the target, provided that they ensure long term protection to nature.<\/li>\n
  6. Local communities need to be engaged, to ensure buy-in and benefits for them.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    All this is very much in line with what environmental NGOs have been saying for a long time (see for example, Wildlife and Countryside Link\u2019s reports on\u00a0protected areas\u00a0and the\u00a0Habitats Regulations).<\/p>\n

    In a nutshell: if properly managed, funded and protected in the long term, protected areas will play a key role in halting nature decline in the UK, besides providing a wide range of benefits to all of us. The target has already been agreed: now implementation will be key.<\/p>\n

    For more information, download the\u00a0BES report on protected areas and nature recovery.<\/a><\/p>\n

    Read more….<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Prof. Rick Stafford and Prof. Jane Hill have summarised the key findings of the British Ecological Society (BES) report on protected areas for the House of Lords\u2019 Environment and Climate Change Committee inquiry into protected areas. image: for illustration – … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-36078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sector-newsblog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=36078"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36078\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":36080,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36078\/revisions\/36080"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=36078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=36078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/newsblogs.ihbc.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=36078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}