Rural Scotland People, Prosperity and Partnership

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Our Responsibilities to the Natural Heritage

The Government has significant obligations to the protection and enhancement of our natural heritage. We have entered fully into the growing movement, worldwide, to take action to preserve and enhance the natural heritage, and this continues action which we have been pursuing for many years. In so doing we have joined with our European partners to put in place arrangements for protection of species and habitats, through such measures as the Natura 2000 network, which is the practical expression of the 1979 EC Birds Directive9 and the 1992 EC Habitats Directive10. Having signed the Biodiversity Convention11 at the Earth Summit in Rio, the United Kingdom became one of the first countries to produce a biodiversity strategy in January 1994. The Action Plan commits us to:

• seek to conserve and where possible enhance wild species and wildlife habitats;
• ensure that all policy areas respect and integrate these concerns;
• increase awareness and involvement in conserving biodiversity.

We have contributed fully to the 1995 European Year of Nature Conservation. Scottish Natural Heritage has a full programme of events to mark the year which is intended to press home to everyone the importance of nature conservation, not just for the intrinsic interest of wildlife but because it is the vital resource on which much of our rural economy is based.

Scottish Natural Heritage

The Natura 2000 Network