BIOFORUM

The European Biodiversity Forum

News:

Two new BIOFORUM reports on "Biodiversity conflict management" and "The Ecosystem Approach applied to Spatial Planning" are now ready. If you require a paper copy please contact Juliette Young (j.young@ceh.ac.uk)

The paper entitled "Towards sustainable land use: identifying and managing the conflicts between human activities and biodiversity conservation in Europe" was published in the June edition of the Biodiversity and Conservation journal. To access the pdf document please click here.

The report for the Bioforum project entitled "Conflicts between human activities and the conservation of biodiversity in agricultural landscapes, grasslands, forests, wetlands and uplands in Europe" can be viewed as a Pdf document by clicking here.

The report for the Bioforum project entitled "Conflicts between human activities and the conservation of biodiversity in agricultural landscapes, grasslands, forests, wetlands and uplands in the Acceding and Candidate Countries (ACC) " can be viewed as a Pdf document by clicking here.

Please feel free to fill in our questionnaire to help us better understand conflicts between human activities and the conservation of biodiversity in Europe by clicking here. 

BACKGROUND AND AIMS:

The purpose of the BioForum project is to reduce the conflict between the conservation of biodiversity and economic development, particularly within the following thematic areas:

• Boreal, Mediterranean and temperate forests,
• Grasslands (humid and dry),
• Uplands (including alpine regions)
• Riverine and freshwater habitats (inland waters),
• Mixed agricultural / semi-natural habitat landscapes.  

OBJECTIVES AND APPROACH:  

Conflicts between human activities and biodiversity conservation are widespread in European ecosystems. The main cause of species decline is habitat fragmentation or habitat loss due to pressures such as land use change. A number of laws and instruments are in place for biodiversity conservation including the Convention on Biological Diversity, the European Biodiversity Strategy, the Birds and Habitat directives and Biodiversity Action Plans that operate on regional, national and European levels. However, these policies can in some cases be the initial causes of conflicts. 

It is now becoming obvious that measures taken to reduce the impact have not traditionally focussed on the conflict. This is often due to the complex and unique nature of conflicts in terms of temporal and spatial scales, intensity, origins and range of different stakeholders involved in the conflict. When looking at conflicts between human impacts and biodiversity conservation on a scale as big as Europe, the multifaceted conflict nature becomes even more apparent. In order to address the issue of conflict management on all geographical and temporal scales, it becomes apparent that conflict resolution in the long term can only come from a full integration of social, biological and economic aspects.

The main objective of BioForum is to create a European forum for dialogue between stakeholders to reduce the conflict between the conservation of biodiversity and human activities.  The BioForum project is co-funded by the European Union under the Global Change, Climate and Biodiversity Key Action of the Energy, Environment and Sustainable Development Programme. The project analyses those conflicts that are most likely to be having an impact on biodiversity. In the first phase of the project, five thematic working groups were established (forests, grasslands, uplands, freshwater habitats and agricultural landscapes) and a series of workshops, bringing together over 80 participants from 19 European countries, were held to consider sources of conflict, conflict management and monitoring progress in managing conflicts in each thematic area. At these workshops, a number of case studies were discussed.  

The most serious current pressure on biodiversity in Europe is land use change, through urbanization, afforestation and land abandonment coupled with a rapid intensification of agriculture. An illustrative example of changes in land-use that have affected biodiversity is the intensification of European agriculture. The use of fertilisers and biocides, land drainage and clearance, shifts from traditional small scale to new rotation times and introduction of new species can all lead to major hydrological and ecological changes in European ecosystems thus creating conflicts with biodiversity. The causes of conflicts between the conservation of biodiversity and other human activities are difficult to identify and the full long-term consequences of such causes can be practically impossible to quantify or analyse in a systematic way.  In order to progress towards the resolution of these conflicts, it is essential to consider the social drivers that can lead to conflicts in the first place or exacerbate the conflict resolution process.  These strong negative perceptions and barriers have the potential to create or aggravate conflicts between biodiversity and economic development, leading to the idea of an inclusionary framework with improved communication between all stakeholders and better awareness of the habitats and context of the conflicts.

A number of conflict resolution strategies were identified in all European environments but will differ on all temporal and spatial scales. Depending on the nature of the conflicts, measures can range from major changes in the political, legislative and administrative frameworks to local efforts encouraging stakeholder education and communication or improved local scale management plans.

The monitoring of the conflict itself and the outcome of the conflict management process is essential for successful long-term conflict resolution. Social, economic and ecological monitoring data should be used to check the effectiveness of chosen management strategies. As well as selecting monitoring indicators, one has to determine who undertakes the monitoring, who funds the monitoring and how the information derived from monitoring should be used. 

The second phase of the Bioforum project will focus on the management of conflicts at the regional scale, usually involving more than one of the thematic areas discussed previously. It will also consider conflict management in more detail, including a review of the methods currently in use and under development in Europe and their application in situations where conflicts are particularly serious.

The main objectives of the BioForum project are: 

• To create a European forum – BioForum – for dialogue between scientists and stakeholders to reduce the conflict between the conservation of biodiversity and economic development;
• To analyse the principal sources of conflict between biodiversity conservation and economic development in key thematic areas;
• To identify measures for conflict resolution, through attenuating or avoiding negative impacts, with an assessment of their practicability (with regard to economic development) and their legitimacy (in terms of Community legislation / regulations);
• To identify current best practices in biodiversity management, particularly where these relate to biodiversity-related conflict resolution;
• To identify and evaluate methods for monitoring progress in resolving conflicts, including those relating to the Convention of Biological Diversity (CBD) proposals for a core set of indicators.  

THEMATIC  WORKING GROUPS:

BioForum operates through seven Working Groups:  

Urmas Tartes

University of Helsinki, Finland,  

E-Mail: Jari.Niemela@helsinki.fi

Estonian Agricultural University, Estonia E-mail: tartes@zbi.ee

University of Rouen, France, 

E-Mail: Didier.Alard@univ-rouen.fr 

Klaus Henle 

Tiiu Kull

Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ), Leipzig, Germany, 

E-Mail: Henle@pro.ufz.de  

Estonian Agricultural University, Estonia, E-mail: tiiu@zbi.ee

Dept of Environmental Assessment, Uppsala, Sweden, 

E-Mail: Richard.Johnson@ma.slu.se

Simone Matouch

Kateřina Scharffová 

ARGE, Austria,

E-Mail: simone.matouch@a-v-l.at 

Charles University, Czech Republic, Scharffova@seznam.cz

Fons vd Heydenstraat 57, Netherlands, E-Mail: nowicki@iae.nl  

University of Wolverhampton, UK,

E-Mail:  p.s.jones@wlv.ac.uk