The first committee of its kind in the world, the remit of the Natural Capital Committee (NCC) is to help the Government better understand how the state of the natural environment affects the performance of the economy and wellbeing, and to provide advice on how to manage our “natural wealth” in an efficient and sustainable way.

The creation of the NCC was a commitment of the Government’s Natural Environment White Paper, which set out the vision that “Government wants this to be the first generation to leave the natural environment of England in a better state than it inherited”. Reporting to the Economic Affairs Committee – chaired by the Chancellor of the Exchequer – the NCC has a real opportunity influence the economic policy of the UK for the good of the natural environment.

First State of Natural Capital Report

The NCC has now published its first State of Natural Capital report, setting out a framework that will help natural capital be hard wired into economic decision making in this country. The report also highlights the work the committee will be undertaking over the coming year to better understand which of our natural assets are critical to our wellbeing.

Committee Chairman Dieter Helm describes the ambition of the NCC and the importance of natural capital in his foreword to the report:

“We have an ambitious work programme that will make a genuine contribution to the better protection and enhancement of our valuable natural assets. Our economic prosperity and the wise use of our natural resources are not mutually exclusive. In fact, the latter is a precondition of the former, in [..] the short, medium and long-term. Economic growth must be sustainable – otherwise it will not be sustained.”

Understanding and valuing natural capital

In the introduction to the report, the NCC defines natural capital as:

“Natural capital” refers to those elements of nature which either directly provide benefits or underpin human wellbeing. In this way, natural capital generates value for people.

However, the ubiquitous nature of the relationship between the natural environment and human wellbeing means that the definition of natural capital is necessarily wide and includes many different types of assets. The term natural capital therefore embraces the more immediately obvious assets associated with land (such as woodlands, fields, urban parks and subsoil assets), the water environment (for example, rivers, lakes, groundwater and seas) and the atmosphere (for example, clean air, and an equable climate). However, natural capital also includes the myriad processes which underpin and generate the services which the natural environment provides (for example, the water cycle, soil fertility processes and atmospheric gas exchange).

Therefore, natural capital comprises, quite literally, a wealth of component parts; parts whose sum underpins not only all economic activity but life on earth itself.

Although natural capital is integral to our economy we do not at present directly measure changes in its extent or quality, or account for it in national accounts. Neither do we adequately reflect its value in day to day decisions about what and how much to produce and consume. Most of the time natural capital is effectively ascribed zero value.

Available evidence suggests we are failing to conserve our natural capital assets and invest in them adequately. In many cases we are increasingly demanding more from them while at the same time eroding their capacity to deliver. The risk is that rather than underpinning future growth and prosperity, degraded natural capital assets will act as a break on progress and development.

Furthermore, by failing to invest adequately in maintenance and enhancement, we risk missing opportunities that better management and stewardship of natural capital can offer.

Key messages and recommendations

The report’s recommendations are grouped under four key messages:

Assessing progress on natural capital

In conclusion, the report asserts that genuinely embedding the value of natural capital into the fabric of economic decision-making is crucial to achieving the vision of Natural Environment White Paper for nature and our natural capital assets.

In subsequent State of Natural Capital reports, the NCC will develop these ideas and evidence further, reporting on progress against the suggested recommendations.

Further reading

• State of Natural Capital Report 2013: available to download

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• Natural Environment White Paper, one year on

The UK NEA has gained international recognition and is regarded as a significant step forward in our understanding of trends in the delivery of ecosystem services, the drivers of these trends and the likely consequences for human well-being. It delivered a wealth of information on the state, value (economic and social) and possible future of terrestrial, freshwater and marine ecosystems across the UK. The key messages in the Synthesis Report concluded that:

“A move to sustainable development will require an appropriate mixture of regulations, technology, financial investment and education, as well as changes in individual and societal behaviour and adoption of a more integrated, rather than conventional sectoral, approach to ecosystem management.”

Informing policy

The Natural Environment White Paper, which drew heavily on the analysis carried out in the UK NEA, set out the Government’s policy on protecting and improving the natural environment, and committed to supporting “a further phase of ground-breaking research” to “investigate the mix of future actions most likely to secure the most benefits for nature and for people from our ecosystems”.

Funded by Defra, the Welsh Government and three Research Councils (the Arts and Humanities Research Council, the Economic and Social Research Council and the Natural Environment Research Council), the Follow-on phase commenced in February 2012. The overall goal of the project is to develop an improved evidence base to implement the ecosystem services paradigm within the ecosystems approach, and thereby facilitate more informed decision making.

Further research

A number of important scientific evidence gaps identified in the first phase of the UK NEA have formed the basis for the research component of the Follow-on phase. The four areas include:

• Further development of the economic analysis;
• Exploring cultural ecosystem services and cultural, shared and plural values;
• Further analysis of future ecosystem changes; and
• Reviewing and enhancing tools and supporting materials for use by a range of key user groups.

Communicating the findings

Communicating the messages of the UK NEA together with findings from the new research and making them applicable to decision and policy making at a range of organisational and spatial scales across the UK will be one of the key aims of the Follow-on phase.

Reporting in early 2014, the Follow-on phase will once more bring together experts from a wide variety of specialisms together with a broad range of stakeholders from the public, private and voluntary sectors. The enhanced knowledge base will provide some of the evidence needed for the new Natural Capital Committee, which aims to put natural capital at the heart of Government accounting.

Further reading

• UK National Ecosystem Assessment: more details on the research being undertaken for the follow-on phase, opportunities for how to get involved in the project, synthesis / technical reports available to download

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• Can payment for ecosystem services help safeguard the environment?

Following the online discussion announced in the introduction to the project in the March edition of SD Scene and work by the Green Food Project steering group, subgroups and synthesis group, initial conclusions have now been published.

The Green Food Project is a partnership project looking ahead to the challenges of increasing food production and enhancing the environment in England. The initial conclusions include a full report, the subgroup reports and a summary of the online forum discussions. The project follows a commitment in the Natural Environment White Paper to:

‘bring together government, industry and environmental partners to reconcile how we will achieve our goals of improving the environment and increasing food production.’

Conclusions: trade-offs and strategic steps

The conclusions recognised that some ‘win-win’ scenarios are possible in the future. But as the number and scale of possible win-wins will vary, there is a need for us to adopt the ‘right management for the right place’. Decisions will also need to be made on how best to balance the trade-offs to deliver maximum benefits. There can be trade-offs between production, the environment and other factors, such as animal welfare or things of social value, for example through the adoption of free range poultry or livestock systems.

There is no one path that can be taken to solve the problems and challenges ahead. A number of strategic steps were identified that will place us in a better position, including:

• More coordinated research and more innovative technology;
• Improved knowledge exchange across the food chain, between farmers and from research labs to farms, and back again to labs;
• Ensuring we have the right talented and entrepreneurial young people entering the food industry;
• Giving farmers and food businesses the confidence to make the right investment;
• Ensuring we have the right business structures that will enable fair and effective sustainable growth;
• Developing a clear understanding of the value of services that our natural environment provides;
• Adopting an approach that will enable us to best use the land.

While the initial conclusions of the Green Food Project focused more on the challenges of increasing food production and improving the environment, we recognise that tackling consumption and waste are an important part of the equation. To explore this further, a debate has been called for to feed into wider thinking about our food system.

Farming Minister Jim Paice described the project’s aims:

“With our increasingly hungry world every country must play its part to produce more food and improve the environment. Britain already punches above its weight, but we’re a small island with limited space, so we’ve got to show leadership and play to our strengths more efficiently.

“We’re not talking about setting Soviet-style targets but an overall approach in which the whole food chain pulls together. Whether it means embracing new farming technology or people wasting less, we’ve got to become more sustainable.”

Continuing work

This is not the end of the Green Food Project. More needs to be done to build on the initial conclusions and the project partners will be continuing to work together to make sure the aims of the project are delivered.

Further reading

• Green Food Project conclusions: overall conclusions, sub-group reports and summary of online forum

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• Environmental Stewardship and food security
• Sustainable food round-up: fair food, UK food system, world agriculture, community growing

Field margin on farm managed under Environmental Stewardship

A new report commissioned by Natural England, Ecosystem services from Environmental Stewardship that benefit agricultural production, assesses the role of Environmental Stewardship in protecting the environment and agricultural food production. The report:

• Shows how Environmental Stewardship schemes can help protect soil and water, regulate pest species and improve pollination, which in turn helps support crop production;
• Reinforces the key role farmers and land managers in Environmental Stewardship play in enhancing the natural environment without compromising their ability to produce food;
• For the first time, maps the distribution of the major ecosystems services provided by Environmental Stewardship options.

Providing ecocsystem services

The report found that Environmental Stewardship schemes – which provide funding to farmers and other land managers in England to deliver effective environmental management on their land – are delivering a range of vital goods and services, known as ecosystem services – which benefit the natural environment and in doing so help sustain and develop agricultural productivity.

Ecosystem services are defined as the benefits society gets from the natural environment, including cultural services such as the conservation of biodiversity and people’s enjoyment of the countryside, regulating services, such as flood protection, clean air and water and provisioning services such as the production of food, timber and other resources. Many of these services are provided by agricultural land. While farmers are rewarded for the provisioning services by the market, Environmental Stewardship is a major source of funding that helps farmers maintain and enhance the cultural and regulatory services that their land provides.

The Natural Environment White Paper identified the need to increase food production whilst protecting, enhancing and linking biodiversity and landscapes. To meet this challenge, land managers need to have a better understanding of the complex relationships between the different ecosystem services that farmland can potentially provide. This research was commissioned from the Food and Environment Research Agency (Fera) to identify the ecosystem services which Environmental Stewardship helps to provide as the main agri-environment scheme in England.

Supporting food production

The research found many examples of how ecosystem services supported by Environmental Stewardship contribute to food production, including:

• Pollination services are provided by many Environmental Stewardship options, with those delivering early pollen and nectar sources and season-long floral resources particularly important. Farms under organic management are likely to deliver more for bumblebees due to the legume content of rotational grassland;
• Control of pest species by natural enemies is encouraged by Environmental Stewardship options supporting hedgerows, flower margins, species-rich grassland and beetle banks;
• Conservation of genetic resources is supported by options such as traditional orchard and species-rich grassland management, as well as native breed supplements;
• Converting land to grassland benefits microscopic soil animals which improve soil organic matter content, while options where legumes are sown increase soil nitrogen, organic matter and soil wildlife.

Ian Fugler, Land Management Director for Natural England, described the importance of Environmental Stewardship to food security and the environment:

“Long-term food security and a healthy natural environment are inextricably linked. This report highlights how Environmental Stewardship supports the important role farmers play both in putting food on the table and providing a whole range of vital goods and services – protecting wildlife, managing water, storing carbon, looking after woodlands and hedgerows, and planting new ones, and shaping much-loved landscapes for people to explore and enjoy”.

Further reading

• Ecosystem services from Environmental Stewardship that benefit agricultural production: full report available to download

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• Producing food and improving the environment: Green Food Project conclusions

The Natural Environment White Paper (NEWP) responded to the views of the public, environmental charities, nature reserves and businesses when it was published in June 2011. It built on the groundbreaking research in the UK National Ecosystem Assessment and on Making Space for Nature, the independent review of England’s wildlife sites. One year on, progress has been made to put the value of nature at the heart of decision-making in government, communities and businesses. Here, we take a look at the measures introduced.

What is the Natural Environment White Paper?

The white paper, titled The Natural Choice: securing the value of nature, set out 92 commitments to achieve a healthy natural environment to be the foundation of sustained economic growth, prospering communities and personal wellbeing. The commitments also had the aim of harnessing and supporting the enthusiasm that people have for protecting and enjoying the natural environment.

The white paper has been mainstreamed across Government since its publication, and departments are working with businesses, farmers and landowners, local authorities and environmental organisations to implement it. However, the Government has also been clear that everyone can make a difference when it comes to looking after the environment.

What progress has been made so far?

Throughout government, a range of initiatives have been implemented that focus on protecting and improving the natural environment – many that support local action.

Biodiversity 2020 was published by Defra just two months after the release of the NEWP. It set out a strategy for England’s wildlife and ecosystems services, and stakeholder groups are now helping to deliver the plan. A share of £1 million of capacity building funding has been shared among 47 partnerships, and applications are now being received for formal recognition as a Local Nature Partnership, which aims to improve the range of benefits and services people get from a healthy natural environment.

The last issue of Landscape reported how 12 Natural Improvement Areas (NIAs) have been chosen to receive a share of £7.5 million of government funding. The sites cover a wide area of England, and work has now begun on enhancing and protecting ecosystems for wildlife and people. These areas were a response to a recommendation from Sir John Lawton, who found that England’s wildlife sites were fragmented and unable to respond to pressures such as climate change and population growth.

Another focus is growing a green economy. An independent Natural Capital Committee has been set up to advise the Economic Affairs Committee on the state of natural assets in England. A business-led Ecosystem Markets Task Force is now assessing opportunities for UK businesses from expanding trade in green goods and the market for sustainable natural services. Defra, the Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) and the Department for Business Innovation and Skills (BIS) have publishedEnabling the transition to a green economy: Government and business working together, which maps out planned action until 2020 across areas including resource efficiency, waste prevention and carbon capture and storage.

Reconnecting people with nature for mutual benefit is also an important part of the white paper. Defra has started initiatives such as the Green Infrastructure Partnership to help local communities to improve green spaces, and is supporting the Love Where You Live campaign.

Activity across government includes the Department of Transport funding walking and cycling initiatives; the Health and Safety Executive issuing guidance for school trips; the Department for Education streamlining its advice on health and safety law for schools; and the Department of Health recognising links between good health and the environment in its public health outcomes framework.

What is coming up next?

In July, the anniversary of the white paper will be marked with an event linking progress at home and abroad. The Secretary of State, Caroline Spelman, will be announcing a range of initiatives flowing from the white paper, and Defra will be publishing a Natural Environment White paper Implementation Update.

Further reading

• The White Paper – One year on: Defra reviews progress to secure the value of nature

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• Securing the value of nature in English national parks

Tree planting at Caldbeck in the Lake District

National Park Authorities welcomed the publication of the Natural Environment White Paper (NEWP) – The Natural Choice: securing the value of nature – in 2011. National Park Authorities (NPAs) were already making a significant contribution to the main themes of the White Paper in their own right and collectively as a network but we also recognised that the White Paper signalled the need for a step change in what we do and achieve. Here we highlight some of the progress on delivery of key NEWP aims.

As well as through individual activities and projects, NPAs can also support the White Paper’s implementation by working collectively through ENPAA on priority projects, sharing experience, and acting as pilots. We look forward to continuing to work with existing and new partners to deliver NEWP outcomes.

In our progress report we highlight some of the work NPAs are doing to deliver three of the themes of the NEWP:

Protecting and improving our natural environment

• Local Nature Partnerships and Nature Improvement Areas – all NPAs are involved in LNPs. Two NIAs are primarily located in National Parks.
• Restoring nature in our rivers and water bodies – continuing with existing catchment level work and new restoration projects.
• Protecting and improving our woodland and forests – contributing to the Independent Panel on Forestry’s work and working to increase woodland cover inside and adjacent to National Parks.

Growing a green economy

• Growing business opportunities that pay back to nature – NPAs have been involved with innovative work on payments for ecosystems services and use of an ecosystems approach to project management and spatial planning.
• NPAs run or support a range of initiatives to develop local green economies including the Sustainable Development Fund, business forums, training and skills programmes and investing in local infrastructure such as livestock markets and community renewable energy schemes.

Reconnecting people and nature

• Connecting through education in and about the natural environment and Connecting by improving access to the countryside – This theme underpins the work of the NPAs in a fundamental way but our activity is most visible through education and engagement programmes. One of the most successful programmes of recent years has been the engagement in the Mosaic project led by the Campaign for National Parks.

The full report gives more details of the work of NPAs to deliver the NEWP, and a few case studies. It does not provide an exhaustive description of all the activities NPAs undertake in delivering our purposes, shared vision – The English National Parks and Broads UK Government Vision and Circular 2010 – and the NEWP ambitions. While the areas of work indicated above are common to all National Parks the degree and type of activity varies. Each NPA will make use of local opportunities and resources to best suit local needs and aspirations.

Further reading

• Securing the value of nature in English national parks: further details and full progress report available to download
• The English National Parks and Broads UK Government Vision and Circular 2010 (pdf)

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• Sustainable Development in England’s National Parks

“Too many of the benefits we derive from nature are not properly valued. The value of natural capital is not fully captured in the prices customers pay, in the operations of our markets or in the accounts of government or business. When nature is undervalued, bad choices can be made.

“We will put natural capital at the centre of economic thinking and at the heart of the way the way we measure economic progress nationally. We will include natural capital within the UK Environmental Accounts. We will establish an independent Natural Capital Committee to advise the Government on the state of natural capital in England.”
Natural Environment White Paper

One of the high profile announcements in the Natural Environment White Paper, The Natural Choice: Securing the Value of Nature, was the creation of the independent Natural Capital Committee. The Committee reports to the Economic Affairs Committee (chaired by the Chancellor of the Exchequer) and aims to provide independent expert advice on the state of English natural capital.

What is Natural Capital?

“Natural capital can be defined as the stock of our physical natural assets (such as soil, forests, water and biodiversity) which provide flows of services that benefit people (such as pollinating crops, natural hazard protection, climate regulation or the mental health benefits of a walk in the park). Natural capital is valuable to our economy. Some marketable products such as timber have a financial value that has been known for centuries. In other cases (eg the role of bees in pollinating crops), we are only just beginning to understand their financial value.”
Natural Environment White Paper

Natural capital is one of four ‘capitals’ which are typically recognised in economics; the others are produced capital (like cars), human capital (like skilled workers) and social capital (like strong relationships between neighbours). The final output of our economy and the wellbeing of society are based on all four capitals.

Examples of natural capital are all around us, from urban parks to fields in the countryside, from fish stocks to bees. For inhabitants and visitors, it might seem as if England’s natural capital, its parks, countryside and lakes, are beyond price, but in reality natural capital is not being properly valued. In economic terms, the market is failing to allocate resources efficiently. Decisions, like where to build housing or whether land is more valuable as a park or as a car park, are made without the full set of information and values. The Government is hoping to resolve these problems through a variety of approaches. One is the Ecosystem Markets Task Force, which advises business on the services which flow from our natural capital. Another is the Natural Capital Committee, which directly advises the Government.

What the Committee will do

The Natural Capital Committee’s remit, as defined in the white paper, is to:

1. Provide advice on when, where and how natural assets are being used unsustainably
2. Advise the Government on how it should prioritise action to protect and improve natural capital, so that public and private activity is focused where it will have greatest impact on improving wellbeing in our society
3. Advise the Government on research priorities to improve future advice and decisions on protecting and enhancing natural capital

The Committee met for the first time on 23 May, and is currently agreeing how it will begin to tackle its remit.

Who is on the Committee?

The Chair of the Committee, Dieter Helm, was announced in March. Dieter is a highly influential economist, professor at the University of Oxford and a fellow of New College, Oxford. He has published widely on environmental and economic issues, and has just completed a study of climate change policy to be published by Yale University Press in autumn 2012. He has been involved in the development of environmental policy in Britain and Europe since the mid 1980s, and has served as Chairman of the Defra economic advisory panel for a number of years.

Following Dieter’s recruitment, Defra announced the first five members of the Committee. They are all highly skilled and influential experts, genuine leaders in their field with backgrounds ranging from economics to environmental policy, international politics and ecology.

• Ian Bateman: Ian is Director of the Centre for Social and Economic Research on the Global Environment (CSERGE) at the University of East Anglia. He served as Head of Economics for the UK National Ecosystem Assessment and is a Member of the Defra Science Advisory Council.
• Giles Atkinson: Giles is a Reader in Environmental Policy, and Head of Environmental Economics and Policy Cluster at the Geography and Environment Department of the London School of Economics & Political Science. He is also an associate of the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment. Giles was a contributing author on the National Ecosystem Assessment (NEA), and has also served as a consultant to the World Bank.
• Kerry ten Kate: Kerry is the Director of the Business and Biodiversity Offsets Programme (BBOP) at Forest Trends, and has worked for Kew and the United Nations. Kerry is also currently working on the Defra sponsored Valuing Nature Network, which is supporting the work of the Ecosystem Markets Task Force.
• Robin Smale: Robin is the Director and Founder of Vivid Economics Ltd. He has lead a diverse range of projects across the public and private sectors, including analysing the potential role for a Green Investment Bank in the UK.
• Rosemary Hails. Rosie has a MBE for services to Environmental Research, has served as lead author on diseases and pests section of the National Ecosystem Assessment, and is chair of the Natural Capital Initiative. Rosie is a section head at the NERC Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, and a senior research associate of Oxford University.

Further information

• Natural Capital Committee: full details and updates

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• Natural Environment White Paper, one year on

The Ecosystem Markets Task Force brings together ten industry leaders and experts from a wide range of sectors – from banking and biodiversity, conservation to beauty – to look at how ecosystem markets can provide opportunities for UK business to flourish and grow, while at the same time helping value and protect nature.

The philosophy behind it is that markets can, in some areas, be good for the both business and the environment, not least because we are often trying to correct market failure.

Who is on the Task Force?

Announced in the Government’s Natural Environment White Paper, and launched in the city last November, the Task Force’s members are:

• Ian Cheshire, Task Force Chair and Group Chief Executive Officer, Kingfisher plc;
• Kim Buckland, Co-Founder, Liz Earle;
• Vivienne Cox, Chair, Climate Change Capital;
• Jack Frost, Director of Johnson Matthey Fuel Cells;
• David Hill, Chair of the Environment Bank;
• Russ Houlden, CFO, United Utilities;
• Mike Wright, Executive Director at Jaguar Land Rover;
• Martin Roberts, Programme Director of the Cambridge Natural Capital Leaders Platform;
• Amanda Sourry, Chairman of Unilever UK and Ireland;
• Peter Young, Strategy Director at SKM Enviros and Chairman of the Aldersgate Group.

It’s an impressive roll call, and in less than a year these ten senior business leaders will bring their insight and experience to bear to advise the Government on what business can do to ensure the UK economy is both green and growing.

Reporting to three Secretaries of State (for Business, Innovation & Skills; Energy & Climate Change; and Environment, Food & Rural Affairs) means this is a real opportunity for business to help the Government shape the market conditions in this emerging area. Bringing together so many brilliant people allows us to leverage their expertise to find real solutions, but finding time in busy diaries can be a challenge!

How the Task Force works

The Task Force is following three steps to identify business opportunities:

• What’s the problem? The Task Force is interested in where the market failures are, and where the environmental problems are.
• What is the evidence, and where does it suggest the opportunities are? The Task Force wants to use the existing evidence wherever possible, because there is a lot of it, and none of us have any desire to waste money or time. The plan is to take a broad look at all the possible opportunities, and narrow them down to the best four of five.
• How does the Task Force (or business, or government) enable and secure these opportunities? What needs to be done so a new market can be opened up, or a current process greened? Who needs to do it – business or government – and how? Regulation, evidence, frameworks for investment: everything is on the table.

It sounds simple, but it isn’t and the Task Force needs your help…

Calling for evidence

…and here’s your opportunity to be involved – a call for evidence has just been launched and is open until 27th April.

The Task Force has written a short paper to set out its thinking to date what the current ideas are and the sort of evidence it is interested in. There’s also a survey with some structured questions. The discussion paper and survey are available online.

We hope a wide range of stakeholders will complete the questionnaire but if you’d rather have a chat please email the secretariat at ecosystemmarketstaskforce@defra.gsi.gov.uk

Anyone can respond to the call for evidence – we really want as wide a range of views as possible, not least because the Task Force is committed to not reinventing the wheel.  We’ll use this information to get a richer understanding of what’s out there, prioritise areas where they think there are opportunities for business and – crucially – start to understand what government (and business) needs to do to realise them.

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• Transformational times call for transformational change
• UK National Ecosystem Assessment: the next phase

On 27th February, Caroline Spelman, Secretary of State at Defra, announced the first 12 Nature Improvement Areas (NIAs)
to create wildlife havens, restore habitats and encourage local people to get involved with nature. Each NIA will receive a share of £7.5m of government funding over three years.

Creating an ecological network

Nature Improvement Areas were a flagship policy contained in last year’s Natural Environment White Paper The Natural Choice, which set out aims to improve the quality of the natural environment across England, halt the decline in habitats and species, and strengthen the connection between people and nature. The 12 NIAs will help meet the commitment of the white paper to support the natural environment to function more effectively through joined-up action at local and national levels to create an ecological network which is resilient to changing pressures.

Significant improvements for wildlife and people will be delivered through the sustainable use of natural resources, restoring and creating wildlife habits, connecting local sites and joining up local action.

Visiting the Birmingham and Black Country Living Landscape NIA, the Secretary of State, Caroline Spelman, said:

“Each of these projects has something different to offer – from the urban areas of Birmingham and the Black Country to the rivers and woods of North Devon; from marshes, coalfields and wetlands to woodland and arable chalkland and grassland. The exciting wildlife projects are the result of different organisations all working together with a common purpose – to safeguard our wildlife for generations to come.”

Professor Sir John Lawton, chair of the selection panel and leader of the 2010 review of England’s wildlife sites and the connections between them, said:

“For more than 40 years I have had the privilege of working on nature-conservation issues in the UK, both as a professional scientist, and in the voluntary sector. Never in all that time have I seen the sort of creativity, partnership working and sheer enthusiasm that the NIA competition has released in consortia that want to deliver more effective conservation for England’s wonderful wildlife in their area. Choosing 12 winners from 76 bids was an awfully difficult task, but I believe we have 12 outstanding NIAs, each unique in what it is setting out to achieve, for the benefits of people and wildlife.”

The Nature Improvement Areas

The 12 NIAs will be:

• Birmingham and the Black Country Living Landscape: includes urban, wetland, river and heath habitats, aiming to create heathland on brownfield sites and 40 hectares of new native woodland;
• Dark Peak: includes moorland and woodland in the Peak District National Park, and will be restoring habitats such as upland heathland and creating 210 hectares of native woodland;
• Dearne Valley Green Heart: mostly farmland and former mining settlements with woodland and wetland; it will be restore the River Don floodplain and create new wetlands and woodlands;
• Greater Thames Marshes: includes agricultural marsh and urban habitats. It will create and enhance grazing marsh, salt marsh and mudflat habitats;
• Humberhead Levels: straddling Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire, it is mainly wetland, lowland and peat habitats. It will create or restore at least 1,427 hectares of wetland habitat;
• Marlborough Downs: this is predominantly a farmer-led partnership looking to restore chalk and grassland habitats and increase the numbers of farmland birds as well as creating a network of traditional clay-lined dewponds to act as wildlife havens;
• Meres and Mosses of the Marches: incorporates wetlands, peat bogs and ponds in Cheshire. It will aim to reduce diffuse pollution by working with farmers, improve peatlands and restore wildlife areas around the River Perry;
• Morecambe Bay Limestones and Wetlands: the most northerly NIA, this consists of limestone, wetland and grassland habitats. It will restore coast and freshwater wetlands and create 200 hectares of woodland, planting 10,000 native trees and develop habitat for six species;
• Nene Valley: within the River Nene regional park, this project will work with farmers to restore habitats and restore tributaries and reaches of the River Nene;
• Northern Devon: this incorporates river, woodland and grassland. The project will recreate and restore 1,000 hectares of priority habitat and restore the River Torridge so that it can support the critically endangered freshwater pearl mussel;
• South Downs Way Ahead: encompasses key chalk sites of the South Downs National Park. The NIA will restore 1,000 hectares of chalk grassland and encourage the return of the Duke of Burgundy butterfly and several species of farmland birds; and
• Wild Purbeck: is a variety of river, wetland, heath and woodland habitat as well as the largest onshore oil field in Western Europe. This NIA will introduce livestock to manage heathland , restore wetland and create or restore 15 ponds as well as creating 120 hectares of new woodland and a new seven hectare saline lagoon.

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• Securing the value of nature in English national parks

The quality of the air that we breathe is of great importance to us all, yet addressing it can be seen to be a barrier to development and economic growth.

While we no longer have the same problems with air pollution that we did during the Great Smog of 1952, which caused thousands of deaths in just a few days, there still remains more that we must do to improve air quality in order to improve human health, protect the environment and to meet the requirements of European legislation. This will require hard choices to be made, and changes to our behaviour in order to reduce our impacts on air quality in pursuit of sustainable development.

Air pollution’s impacts on health and the environment

The impacts of air pollution on human health are recognised in the Government’s public health white paper, Healthy Lives, Healthy People: Our Strategy for Public Health in England. Studies suggest that air pollution causes an average decrease in life expectancy in the UK of approximately six months, which increases for those who suffer from a range of illnesses affecting the heart or the lungs. The economic costs of this are estimated at up to £19 billion per year.

Air quality significantly affects our environment, damaging plants and animals and reducing our crop yields. As set out in the natural environment white paper, The Natural Choice: securing the value of nature, a healthy and properly functioning natural environment is the foundation of sustained economic growth, prospering communities and personal wellbeing.

Meeting European standards

Our air quality has now reached the standards set by our European legislative framework for most pollutants in most areas but achieving and maintaining compliance in major urban areas is a challenge for most member states, including the UK. It has been difficult in the past to achieve the standards on particulate matter (PM10) in London but the European Commission has accepted our case for additional time to meet the limits in London. Meeting the limits for nitrogen dioxide in a number of roadside locations is particularly difficult, with transport emissions having a significant impact on local air quality. Unfortunately some EU measures, such as new diesel vehicle engine standards, have not delivered all the expected emission reductions across the EU.

Through the European Commission’s review of existing air quality legislation, we need to ensure that the regime is credible, focuses on outcomes and takes account of the compliance challenges faced by most member states. We expect that the review will explore the scope for further reducing the negative impacts of air pollution on our health and on the environment, and consider how to simplify and streamline the legislation to make it as effective as possible.

Further improvements to air quality

The Government is taking action to improve air quality further, working with our partners in local government and in industry. We recently submitted air quality plans to the European Commission, which set out over 80 national measures (e.g. electric vehicle support), plus a number of local measures aimed at improving air quality at particular ‘hot spots’, which are supported by the Government-funded Air Quality Grant.

Transport emissions remain one of the largest causes of air pollution in the UK, particularly in urban areas such as London, which is why we committed £5 million of additional funding to the Mayor of London for local transport measures in 2011 to reduce the risk of exceeding limit values for particulate matter. We are investigating the options for a national framework of Low Emission Zones, as already seen in London and some parts of the continent, to assess their potential in improving urban air quality.

Industrial emissions are also significant. The Government will be consulting in early 2012 on the Industrial Emissions Directive, which came into force in early January 2011. This Directive clarifies and simplifies seven existing directives, which it will replace, whilst maintaining a high level of environmental protection.

Addressing air quality in policy

Air quality policy cuts across the work of various different Government departments. We need to work in partnership across Government, thinking carefully about how air quality fits with other policies, the Government’s commitment to the growth agenda, and efforts to simplify regulation. Difficult decisions will need to be taken, and we must consider how our actions affect air quality.

Many of the measures that can reduce our impacts on climate change in pursuit of sustainable development will also have a beneficial effect on air quality. However, we need to prioritise measures which are mutually beneficial, such as the increased use of public transport, cycling and walking, and work carefully on measures where compromises may be required, such as on limiting emissions from biomass heat installations in urban areas. Only then can we view air quality as a proper consideration in sustainable development, rather than as a barrier to progress.

Further reading

• Air quality: Defra’s work on air quality in the UK.