A Government-led landscape-scale initiative aims to create a step change in nature conservation. But what does this mean in practice? Using one of the recently designated Nature Improvement Areas as an example, the author tests the initiative’s principles.
In 2010, Professor Sir John Lawton was commissioned by the Government to undertake a review of nature conservation in England. The resultant report, Making Space for Nature, concluded that a step change in nature conservation is required, in order to establish ‘a coherent and resilient ecological network’ of benefit to both wildlife and people.