Before I complete my migration from the RSPB to start my new job as BirdLife International's Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia, I want to offer some final reflections from my decade as Conservation Director.  Today, I talk about the power of people and partnerships.

During the first lockdown last year, like many, I wasn’t sleeping very well.  The only way I seemed to be able to settle was to mentally…

Before I complete my migration from the RSPB to start my new job as BirdLife International's Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia, I want to offer some final reflections from my decade as Conservation Director.  Today, I talk about our efforts to influence public policy, law, attitudes and behaviour.

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Early on in my career, I realised that I was not I was not going to be a research biologist…

Before I complete my migration from the RSPB to start my new job as BirdLife International's Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia, I want to offer some final reflections from my decade as Conservation Director.  Today, I talk about our species recovery work.

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While I am convinced that area-based approaches will deliver huge amounts for wildlife, the RSPB will never take its eyes off…

Before I complete my migration from the RSPB to start my new job as BirdLife International's Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia, I want to offer some final reflections from my decade as Conservation Director.  Today, I talk about our practical conservation work on and off nature reserves.

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About 70% of the RSPB’s total conservation expenditure is dedicated to practical work to protect and…

Before I complete my migration from the RSPB to start my new job as BirdLife International's Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia, I want to offer some final reflections from my decade as Conservation Director.  Today, I talk about the role of science in driving the RSPB’s conservation work.

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Soon after I started as Conservation Director, I worked with the then Head of Conservation Science…

Before I complete my migration from the RSPB to start my new job as BirdLife International's Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia, I want to offer some final reflections from my decade as Conservation Director.  It will be cathartic for me and hopefully useful for you. 

I started this job three years after the credit crunch, with a new coalition government at Westminster seeking to tackle the deficit through…

In the run up to a crucial meeting of G7 Environment Ministers next week and the Leaders’ summit in June, using data from the Natural History Museum, the RSPB has today launched a new assessment about how much of the natural world is left in each of the G7 countries.  It shows the UK languishing at the bottom of that list and twelfth worst of 240 countries and territories.  It is a sobering reminder that when we report…

There has recently been better news from Cyprus about the scale of illegal song trapping on the island.  Yet, concerns have now emerged about the UK Government considering plans to relax wildlife protections to enable the development of new resorts, roads and car parks on important wildlife sites.  Below, my colleague Natalie Hall, who is our senior advisor on international site protection, outlines the threat and what needs…

It’s election day across England, Wales and Scotland today.  Don’t forget to vote!  I hope that you are thinking about nature when you cast your vote and then hold your elected representatives to account for the promises made. 

Tomorrow, purdah will end, and politicians can get back to the business of governing and we hope making things better for people and wildlife.

Next week, the Queen will deliver a speech…

Here is a press release that we put out today about how wildlife fared on RSPB reserves in 2020.  It helps to promote our new report and will lift your spirits, I promise.  But, if that doesn't work for you, then why not visit your local RSPB nature reserve this weekend and let nature do its job instead..  

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Despite Covid-19 restrictions affecting access and conservation work in the first half of the…

This afternoon, I took part in an informal Defra-led Earth Day event to showcase some of the work that was being done to improve the natural environment.  I joined colleagues from Cefas, from UNEP-WCMC and the World Economic Forum.  It was a good thing to have done and, with the Biden administration’s Climate Summit in full swing, added to the spirit of Earth Optimism.

I figured that most people would be aware of…

The theme of this week’s Earth Day on 22 April is “Restore our Earth”.  This chimes with the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration which is officially launched in June and, of course, our own Revive our World campaign.

There are a series of events building up to the day itself on 22 April coinciding with the Biden Administration’s climate summit which is being live-streamed and will include a focus…

This is the text of the talk that I gave to the Earth Optimism event today.  You can watch it here or read on!

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Hi, my name is Martin Harper and I am the Conservation Director of the RSPB.  I want to talk to you about the RSPB experience of transforming UK landscapes for wildlife, for the climate and for people. 

My intention is to add to the spirit of Earth Optimism by demonstrating that we…

After 17 fantastic years (the last ten on the Management Board) I am going to leave the RSPB at the end of May.

But, I am not going far, because from 7 June I will be BirdLife International’s new Regional Director for Europe and Central Asia.

For those of you that don’t know, BirdLife International is the world’s largest nature conservation Partnership made up of >100 grassroots, national conservation organisations…

Earlier this week, I was asked at short notice to take part in an event all about nature-based solutions and adaptation to climate change.  It was convened by Aspen UK which is working with the European Union to explore its new relationship with the UK.  The EU Ambassador to the UK spoke alongside Clara de la Torre (the European Commission’s Deputy Director General for Climate Action) who introduced the EU’s Adaptation…

I have been horrified by the events of the past ten days.  The murder of Sarah Everard sparked outrage but also acted as a trigger for many women to share their stories of how they have been harassed or worse including when watching wildlife in the countryside.  

Some of these stories have been told by friends and colleagues (see for example here).  What I have heard has been very upsetting.  But I also felt a sense of shame…

In my second blog in a series about post-Brexit agriculture reform across the UK, I want to put a spotlight on England.

Signs had been good back in 2018 when Defra set out its plans including a commitment to redirect public money from area-based subsidies to public goods via a new environmental land management (ELM) scheme.

We had been campaigning hard to secure this change given that agriculture policy remains the biggest…

In an interview for the Radio 4 programme, Costing the Earth, last week, I was asked to compare progress in establishing the new legal and governance framework across the four countries of the UK.  

Drawing heavily on the analysis we produced at the beginning of the year, it was good to be able to report how each of the administrations were managing both the jeopardy and opportunity presented by Brexit.

It was particularly…

Last month, in partnership with Compassion in World Farming and the United Nations Environment Programme, Chatham House launched an excellent new report called ‘Food System Impacts on Biodiversity Loss’.  Agriculture is acknowledged as the major driver of biodiversity decline globally, across Europe and within the UK and this report not only outlined the problem but also highlighted the three main interventions…

Following the Scottish Government’s announcement that it would end burning on deep peat, and the Committee on Climate Change’s call to end rotational burning, the UK Government has made a similar commitment today.

Any progress on this issue is, of course, to be welcomed.

It is particularly pleasing to see Defra conclude:

 “There is a consensus that burning of vegetation on blanket bog is damaging to peatland…

Some claim that today is "Blue Monday" - the most depressing of the day of the year because the weather is rubbish, the holiday season is over and there are big bills to pay.  This may or may not be correct but it is certainly true that many people suffer from seasonal affective disorder.  What's more, the pandemic is making life even more difficult with studies showing that people’s mental health is being…

In what seems a lifetime ago, on 23 June 2016 the UK voted to leave the European Union.  Our environmental laws and agriculture/fisheries policies had been shaped by our membership of the EU for over 43 years, so at the time the vote to leave the EU presented a disorientating mix of jeopardy and opportunity for nature.

Given what was at stake, we set out seven tests to assess ensure that the UK departure from the EU would…

Amidst the turmoil of 2020, you may have missed the publication of a paper prepared by all the world’s leading conservation organisations (including BirdLife International) that called for a new Global Goal for Nature.  Designed to influence the global biodiversity talks due to culminate in a UN summit in Kunming in China in May 2021, it urges governments to commit - in parallel to the UN Climate Convention's “net…

2020 was meant to be a super year but it has ended up being deeply traumatic for all of us.

We all now know the human health and economic consequences of what happens if we fail to treat nature with respect. 

While the origin of the coronavirus remains uncertain, one silver lining is that there is now greater public understanding about zoonotic diseases and how habitat degradation and wildlife trade may exacerbate the…

I sense a shift in momentum in how political leaders are addressing the nature and climate emergency.  A raft of climate advice and strategies emerged last week from the Committee on Climate Change  and the UK Government.  Our team has spent some time scrutinising what they all mean.  We are particularly interested in the role of nature in helping deliver ambition in climate change mitigation and adaptation and, of course…