27
Apr 2009 Europe clears forests, ploughs
fields, drains wetlands and builds cities
and roads, often at the expense of natural
ecosystems. But how much does our current
consumption and production affect the integrity
of ecosystems? How much and how fast is
the loss of biodiversity in Europe? The
European Environment Agency (EEA) has provided
some answers to these questions at a high-level
conference organised this week by the European
Commission.
The event, held in Athens
on 27 and 28 April, brings together policymakers
and experts to explore future priorities
and options for EU biodiversity policy.
Despite significant progress in certain
aspects of biodiversity, recent observations
indicate that Europe will miss its target
of halting biodiversity loss by 2010.
The EEA's core messages
are clear: to maintain biodiversity and
ecosystems, we urgently need to integrate
them more into key sectors, such as agriculture,
forestry and fisheries. Currently, the price
we pay for goods and services does not reflect
their impact on the ecosystems that sustain
them. In order to feed into ongoing policy
discussions, more effective tools should
be developed to assess the state of biodiversity
and its impacts on other environmental concerns.
Professor Jacqueline
McGlade, Executive Director of the EEA,
called for better ecosystem accounting,
which reflects the real value of the natural
capital that we deplete through our economic
activity."External pressures on biodiversity
are not uniform or held in place by geographical
designations, and we must not focus all
our efforts on preserving islands of biodiversity,
while losing nature everywhere else",
she said.
Policymakers and citizens
alike depend on reliable and relevant information
in order to take sound decisions and actions.
Two key sources of information on the state
of biodiversity in Europe, namely SEBI 2010
(Streamlining European Biodiversity Indicators)
and Article 17 of the EU's Habitats Directive,
were at the heart of the overview presented
by Professor McGlade.
The complete set of
SEBI 2010 findings will be available as
an EEA report, to be published online on
World Biodiversity Day, 22 May. Additionally,
the European Commission will present an
overall assessment of Article 17 findings
in the coming months. Country summaries
and regional assessments are already available
through the European Topic Centre on Biodiversity’s
website.
Snapshot of biodiversity
in Europe
The overall status and trends are not favourable,
despite some progress.
Promoting conservation
and sustainable farming practices, especially
in High Nature Value farmlands, is crucial
for biodiversity.
Nitrogen surpluses are
declining but generally remain high, particularly
in lowland western Europe.
Pollution levels in
the marine environment are stable but about
45 % of assessed European stocks are outside
safe biological limits.
Wood harvesting is sustainable but deadwood
in most European countries remains well
below optimal levels from a biodiversity
perspective.
SEBI 2010 in brief
The SEBI 2010 process was started in 2005
to provide a streamlined set of biodiversity
indicators for Europe. It does not create
new monitoring or reporting obligations
for countries. Instead it aims to ensure
consistency between biodiversity indicator
sets at the national and international levels.
The current set includes 26 indicators.
SEBI 2010 relies on
the contribution of more than 120 experts
from across Europe, as well as input from
intergovernmental organisations and NGOs.
Its institutional partners are the European
Environment Agency (and its European Topic
Centre on Biological Diversity), the European
Centre for Nature Conservation, the United
Nations Environment Programme's World Conservation
Monitoring Centre, the European Commission,
the Joint Secretariat of the Pan-European
Biological and Landscape Diversity Strategy
(PEBLDS), and the Czech Republic (as lead
country for the Kiev Resolution on Biodiversity’s
Action Plan on Monitoring and Indicators).
The SEBI 2010 process covers 53 countries
across Europe.
