Conservation of species and habitats

in Bulgaria – the process of selection

SCI – NGO support to the MoEW in

establishing NATURA2000

Andrey Kovatchev

Natura 2000 Expert, BALKANI Wildlife Society, Bulgaria

Directive 92/43 Article 4, subparagraph 1:

Each Member State propose a list of sites which host natural habitat types in Annex

I and the places which present the physical or biological factors essential for the

life and reproduction of species in Annex II

Criteria in Annex III Stage 1

• Annex I habitat: representativity; area in the site/within the country;

conservation of the structure and functions; global assessment of the

value of the site.

• Annex II species: population (size and density) of the in the site/within

the country; conservation habitat’s features and restoration possibilities;

isolation of the population present on the site in relation to the natural

range; global assessment of the value of the site.

Designation process (prior accession)

Budget: 500 000 Euro

Non systematic approach – field inventories of preliminary identified territories (CORINE Biotops Sites, protected areas, expert opinion) on 12.5% of the countries territory

Lack of division between pSCIs and pSPAs.

Inventory without mapping – filling Standard Data Forms (SDFs) on expert opinion base – very, very inaccurate!!!

At the end – based on best expert opinion identified as potential NATURA 2000 sites on 34% of the countries territory. 16 % of them studied.

DEPA project - Green Balkans Federation NGO in cooperation with the Ministry of Environment and

Waters

CORINE Biotops project

Other territories Non protected territories

National Parks

Natural Reserves

Nature Parks

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Map of potential NATURA 2000 sites at the end of 2004

34% of the country’s territory

coverage of all potential sites.

16% of the country’s territory

studied by the end of 2004.

Projects financed by Bulgarian Government:

for inventory of pSCIs and coordination of this action

with other projects: Green Balkans Federation NGO,

budget: 700 000 EURO

Projects of NGOs:

Contribution of other projects with international

financing – overall more than 2 500 000 EURO

Division of work on the designation of pSCIs

• Project of NGO coalition “NATURA 2000 in Bulgaria – public contribution”, PIN MATRA

• Projects of WWF DCP in Danube basin

• GEF project “Conservation of globally important biodiversity in the Rhodope landscape”

• Project “Prime Butterfly Areas” of Butterfly Conservation Europe (Wageningen) and National Natural History Museum, PIN MATRA program

• Project of Forestry Institute of the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences“Inventory and strategy for protection of old growth forests in Bulgaria”, PIN MATRA

• Development of Brown bear action plan, coordinated by BALKANI Wildlife Society, PIN MATRA and BBI MATRA

• Development of Chamois Action Plan: 2007 -2016, implemented by Bulgarian Biodiversity Foundation

• Project of Bulgarian Academy of Sciences on new Bulgarian Red Data Book

• A number of smaller projects

Mapping of grasslands: mapping of existing digital

polygons – CORINE Biotops, scale 1:100 000, only part

of the pSCIs, modeling needed

Mapping of forests: using existing forest inventories scale 1:

5 000; algorithms to transfer them to NATURA 2000

habitats; 90% of the whole country’s territory

Mapping of river habitats: assessed as ine objects (length),

% of stretches occupied by a habitat, part of the country’s

territory

Inventory methods

Inventory methods

Mapping of species

Presence/absence: field mapping of exact localities or

“good” recent literature data (geographic coordinates)/

versus old and inexact data lit. data – mapping of wider

polygons from CORINE Land cover

Localities: suitable only for species with discrete

distribution – colonies, inhabiting discrete limited area

habitats etc. For others – omission mistake!!!

Inventory methods

Mapping of species

Models of suitable habitats (aim to avoid

omission mistake):

Inductive– statistically derived algorithms; in

presence of sufficient and representative

presence or presence/absence data,

statistically validated

Deductive – based on expert opinion and

algorithms, could be statistically validated

(preferred)

Inventory methods

Mapping of species

Models - verification

Verification is not validation!!!

Verification for real population by:

• Real distribution of the species: real field data

• Real population: could less then potential – natural and

anthropogenic influences, only from real field data

Simplified methods

• Number of locations

• Number of UTM grids (distribution, localities)

• Area of distribution (as polygon)

Relative population assessments: modeling and extrapolations, field

extrapolations (transect methods)

Total population: rarely achieved, very comprehensive data needed,

capture recapture, total counting, mostly for rare species

Population units: individuals (all, mature, colonies, inhabited trunks

of trees etc.)

Population assesments

Selection of sites

Expert opinion: fastest, most unsuitable – lack of systematic

approach

Systematic approach based on preliminary mapping:

1. Selection of best areas/localities for particulars species or

habitat

2. First selection of most diverse areas (number of protected

species and habitats in one place)

Real life is always mixture of approach 1 and 2

Selection of sites – big vs. small sites Large sites:

Representative – High quality criterion

Small number

Less administration, simple management, low administrative

costs

Buffer zones included

Small sites: unrepresentative, big number

administration costly, management difficult,

no buffer zones, large edge effects and impacts, impacts from

outside not under control

Administratively fragmented: Artificially unrepresentative

big number

administration costly

management difficult

Buffer zones included

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Large sites: Shadow list - missing site – bigger

gap and problem for government –

better chances to achieve final

adoption

Art. 6 (3) Assessment – difficult to

show significance of the impact –

necessary to have in to account

local impact

Small sites: Shadow list - missing site – smaller

problem for government – smaller chances

to achieve final adoption of all sites

Art. 6 (3) Assessment – easer to show

significance of the impact

Excluding: „holes“ where no habitat

type/ species has been

found

omitting private property

wherever possible

traffic facilities

Selection of sites – big vs. small sites

Till October 2006 - submitted scientific proposals

for pSCIs covering 35% of country’s land territory

October –November 2006 - working group initiated by

NGOs:

•Participants – NGOs, key experts, Ministry of

Environment and Waters, Ministry of Agriculture and

Forestry

•Tasks: to complete sufficient scientific list of pSCIs

according to the criteria of Stage 2

•Results – Optimization of submitted documentation to

225 sites occupying 28,6 % of country’s land territory

Comparison - version 20 October (35%) and version 20 November

(28,6%)

NGOs submitted proposals - Green Balkans Federation, BALKANI Wildlife Society, WWF – DCP

Bulgaria, Center for Environmental Information and Education, Association of Parks

2007

Political process of designation of NATURA 2000 network

Delayed decision of the Council of Ministers

• The decision on list of pSCIs and pSPAs is made on 15 February 2007 –

one and a half months after EU accession date

•The decision is made available to public on 5 March 2007.

•The decision is to cut both list of sites leading to drastic insufficiencies in

both lists.

•The decision is justified on purely economic grounds. It stipulates future

exclusion from borders of SPAs and SACs of all areas with development

demands and spatial plans appeared to date of issuing of designation

order.

List of pSCIs – excluded (red) and adopted (green)

2007

Every week protests for NATURA 2000 in

front of the Council of Ministers Political umbrella…

Soap opera

Coins to pay

EU sanctions

Species left

outside of

NATURA

2000

2007

•Written statements and submission in

Brussels, meetings with representatives of EU

Commission and with the European

Commissioner Stavros Dimas (April

2007)(with support of international networks)

- network so week that even biogeographical

seminar could not be started

•Number of other street protest for

protection of NATURA sites and

against different threats

•Campaign within government –

letters, position papers, meetings

with Ministers

After 1 year of an NGO campaign almost all proposed sites

adopted in December 2007 and submitted in EU – SPAs and pSCIs

Overlapping between pSCIs (28,6) and SPAs (23,4)–together 34,5%

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2007

Political process of designation of NATURA 2000 network

• Final differences – scientific proposal – political

decision (despite 1 year delay)

• pSCIs – missing site “Rila – buffer” – question left

to be decided by the biogeographical seminars

Thank you for your attention

Andrey Kovatchev

BALKANI Wildlife Society

kovatchev6@gmail.com

www.balkani.org