I regularly bang on about how important our protected areas are. In particular, our Special Protection Areas and Special Areas of Conservation (together forming the European Natura 2000 network) are vital to efforts to safeguarded not just wildlife but also a range of services the natural world provides directly to us. The jargon phrase ‘ecosystems services’ sounds like it should be on the side of a white van – but covers all that water gathering, soil forming, flood protecting, life enhancing stuff that our countryside gives us before you even start counting the birds (but you can do that too).
Well – here’s a an interesting report from the European Environment Agency that packs a lot of details into a short document describing the protected areas of Europe. It’s one of a series they are producing during the course of this International Year of Biodiversity.