Bringing Europes Protected Areas to Europes decision makers

Last Friday 31 protected area practitioners met with the EUROPARC Federation staff and president at a seminar in Montagne de Reims Regional Park and hosted by the Federations French section. The seminar was the first step towards finalising a strategic lobbying document for the Federation, which aims to ensure that Europe's protected areas are increasingly recognised by decision makers in the European Union and other decision making bodies.

The seminar was opened by Dominique Leveque, vice-president of the EUROPARC French section and president of the Regional Park, Jean-Marie Petit, Director of the Parcs Naturaux de France and Deputy President of the French section, and Erika Stanciu, EUROPARC President.

The morning was focused on presentations concerning the topics of policy and advocacy. First up was Joseph van der Stegen who is a policy officer responsible for nature and biodiversity in the European Commission’s Directorate General for Environment. He introduced participants to the environmental policies of the EU, of its achievements to date and the failure of the EU to reach its biodiversity targets for 2010.

Kelly Shanon from the foundation ENVIROPEA, shared information with participants about EU funding mechanisms, e.g. research, LIFE+ and the European ‘Structural’ and ‘Cohesion Funds’. Emma Salizzoni, a researcher at the European Centre for Documentation and Planning for Natural Parks at the Polytechnic of Turin, talked about a research project they have carried out looking at where Natura 2000 sites overlap with protected areas. Jean-Luc Beghin gave us some examples from a practical viewpoint looking at what 3 regional parks in the Region Nord De France, around Calais, have been doing with project applications. And drawing the morning to a close, Jim Dixon, Director of the Peak District National Park, gave very useful tips on how to influence the EU at policy level.

After a great lunch provided by the Maison du Parc the practical part of the seminar began. EUROPARC’s Carol Ritchie took the floor and participants were asked to give their ideas on what the focuses of EUROPARC’s advocacy work should be with a more hands on approach. First in teams of two we looked at themes, then teams of four discussed why the themes were important for the lobbying work and the third step was asking other questions of the themes such as where? who? why? and when?

Finally participants were asked to vote for the issues that they thought were the most important and Erika Stanciu summarised the results. Key conclusions (courtesy of Jim Dixon) were:

• Members are excellent examples of integrated land and nature management
• There are many opportunities to demonstrate practically the implementation of policy in practical examples
• Most EUROPARC members are well connected to local, regional and national governments so can have influence there
• EUROPARC members have expertise on nature management, rural development, sustainable tourism, sustainable farming, fisheries, hunting and forests and spatial and rural land use planning.
• Our work is done on a large scale, with whole and connected landscapes and cross administrative boundaries
• Our work is popular with the public and the places we steward are iconic and help to define Europe – Vienna Woods, Danube Delta, Norwegian Fjords, Lake District, Pyrennees, Alps etc.
• We can demonstrate practical and participatory types of management with many communities
• We bridge urban and rural Europe, with ways of making positive connections such as through visits and ecosystem services.

The seminar was a very positive start to the lobbying work of the Federation and has certainly given impetus to take the work forward.

Read more about the seminar from Jim Dixon on his blog