Evaluation of habitat protection under the European Natura 2000 conservation network - The example for Germany.

ABSTRACT: The world´s largest network of protected areas-Natura 2000 (N2000)-has been implemented to protect Europe´s biodiversity. N2000 is built upon two cornerstones, the Birds Directive, which lists 691 bird species (plus one additional bird genus with no further classification) and the Habitats Directive, which lists next to a variety of species, 233 habitat types to be protected. There is evidence of the positive impact of the Directives on the EU´s biodiversity, although the overall improvement reported for species in favourable condition in the last assessment was low. However, most of the assessments are species focused, while habitats have received very little attention. Here we developed a generic workflow, which we exemplified for Germany, to assess the status of habitat coverage within

SUBMITTER: Friedrichs M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6300216 | biostudies-literature | 2018

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature