A Damp Celebration

The second day of February is a momentous and significant date in history.  Momentous if you are Russian or South African and as it happens, Iranian.  For it was in a comparatively small town in the province of Mazandaran, on the southern and Iranian shores of the Caspian Sea, that an important document was signed.   There were 21 signatures on the original document; today there are 160.

Lake Victoria Ramsar Site, Uganda. Ecotourism generates a sustaible income for local fishermen (centre) punting birders from around the world in search of the enigmatic shoebill (Balaeniceps rex) (left) amongst the tranquil scenery of Lake Victoria (right). Previous to this, they hunted the shoebill - a fish feeder.

This convention, which goes by the rather long title of The Convention on Wetlands of International Importance, especially as Waterfowl Habitat, was signed in the town of Ramsar on the 2nd February 1971; though it didn’t come in to force until December 1975 (when I was 6 months old).  So for all but a very short piece of my life, the wetlands that are designated by what is coveniently and more easily referred to as the Ramsar Convention, have tried to protect these vital habitats.  Vital for waterfowl…but vital for us too.

Many may not have heard of the Ramsar Convention, including David Dimbleby [see 50 mins in to the programme], but this convention aims to:

maintain the ecological character of their Wetlands of International Importance and to plan for the “wise use”, or sustainable use, of all of the wetlands in their [nations] territories.

The UK has 168 Ramsar sites, the most of any nation.  And they are full of wildlife and as you might expect, full of water.  And wetlands are important for humans too; and not just for the pleasure it gives some people in watching waterfowl, otters or other wetland wildlife.  They provide us a service, such as clean water and flood control.  The UK National Ecosystem Assessment (NEA) has calculated a financial value that these habitats give human society.  For example, if all inland wetlands are assumed to generate flood control and storm buffering benefits, the estimated aggregate value is £366 million per year for the UK.  The total financial benefit that inland wetlands give human society has been estimated at almost £1.2 billion.  And if you include coastal wetlands, this rises to just over £7.5 billion each and every year (see Table 4 in this document to see where I got these values from).  That represents approximately 1 % of the UK Governments spending announced in the 2011 budget.  And nature delivers this for free.

There are many other examples of how nature delivers services to us for free – explore the UK NEA’s website yourself to find out.

Water.  Between 60 % to  75 % of us is made of the stuff so I would say that the Ramsar convention is in some way, intimately important to our very being.  So it is certainly worth celebrating this Iranian gift, especially as not much good news comes out of Iran at the moment (which is a great shame).  Perhaps the Iranians and indeed the world should shout a little louder about the Ramsar Convention?

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Leaking Legislation?

Since June 2011, there has rarely been a period when nature conservation legislation or policy (including planning policy) hasn’t been in the news.  In short order, there has been:

• the Government white paper on the natural environment
• UK National Ecosystems Assessment
• England’s Biodiversity Strategy
• National Planning Policy Framework
• The Government’s Red Tape Challenge
• Habitats and Birds Directive Review

And I have blogged on them: here, here, here, here, here, here and here; and these are the ones up to the beginning of October 2011.  My most popular blog to date, was written in early December 2011 and there have been a few more (e.g. here) since then too.  In all, there are thirteen articles, excluding this one, on the subjects listed above.  Has anyone, apart from me, read them all?

Given all this publicity, and if any publicity is good publicity, then these subjects must be getting plenty of column inches, though I don’t profess to know the answer, or even guess, how many column inches published in the UK media (newspapers, on-line blogs etc) that have mentioned these subjects.  As a taster, a brief search on WordPress for ‘NPPF’ reveals a long list of blogs, including mine, but also including this one, this one, this one and this one that have all commented on the NPPF; so the column inches must be considerable.  And it must be serious stuff because the NPPF has been on the BBC too.

So with all these changes, can there be any more before the budget?  Well, thanks to the champion of recycling, advocate of responsible disposal and fervent but apologetic supporter of environmental and sustainable use of resources, the Right Honorable Oliver Letwin MP is proposing to change environmental legislation on similar lines to our planning system.  He is, according to Damian Carrington.  If this is true, and I am not saying it is, then should developers be getting excited?  Well, as I’ve stated in a previous blog (Fall Out):

…whilst the Government has expressed a wish to review how the Directive is applied [my emphasis] through domestic law, it will have to retain legal integrity to avoid conflict with existing judgements, or future challenges.  The Government may well discover that its ability to do so could be very limited.

The same must surely be applied to domestic legislation?

Reducing the text of the thirteen or so primary pieces of legislation dealing with nature conservation (Acts such as the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981) and the handful of secondary pieces of legislation (Regulations such as the Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2010) to fifty or so pages would lead to ambiguity and inevitably, challenges and delays in the courts.  This would be financially and temporally costly as well as enhancing uncertainty.  Not exactly what developers, or our economy needs right now, though it may mean a few more lawyers get employed.

May be these comments have come about because MPs are reported to have ‘little to do’?  May be the Government is testing the water to see how the good folk of Britain react – but then they only need to read the comments on the Red Tape Challenge to get a feel for the good folk of Britain’s views on nature conservation.  It’s not the first time that Oliver Letwin has been reported to say something that he may wish to regret later – ask the good people of Sheffield.  Perhaps there are enough changes afoot to warrant domestic environmental legislation being left alone.  Perhaps we need to collectively pause for thought?

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A Right Royal Wedding

This Easter weekend has been the warmest since 1949 (see here) and it’s been the driest March in years (see here).  Such has been the weather that I can’t recall the last significant wet day here in Leeds – it must have been in February.  This has all been good news for those tiny creatures that most people pay barely any attention to – insects.  In an earlier Blog, I made reference to seven species of butterfly observed in a single day by the Leeds-Liverpool Canal.  This weekend, I made a particular note of recording some less obvious, but no less enchanting insects – hoverflies.  These delicate creatures are not nearly as gaudy as their fellow six-legged cousins…unless of course, you take a closer look – see here, here, here and here.  And here for a hoverfly, well, hovering.  My efforts in a suburban garden yielded six different species: Helophilus pendulus by the pond, Epistrophe eligans holding territory over my lawn and Episyrphus balteatus, which may have migrated from continental Europe to get to my garden; to name but three.

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Living the BREEAM

Sustainable development is in the news; see here, here, here and here.  I particularly like the last article as it was inspired by penguins.  Penguins are probably not the first thing to come to mind when thinking about how to build a house, but perhaps this is one, though possibly an obscure example, of how the natural environment can benefit human society.  This BBC news article illustrates quite graphically how interfering with nature can have the opposite effect on human society…but also how installing natural greenspace can potentially mitigate or avoid future events of similar magnitude.  These benefits that the natural environment can provide to human society is referred to as ecosystem services.

Painted Lady (Cynthia cardui) pollinating teasel (Dipsacus fullonum)

 

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