Examination of Witnesses (Questions 1
- 19)
TUESDAY 16 MAY 2000
DR JEREMY
GREENWOOD AND
DR JULIET
VICKERY
Chairman
1. May I welcome you to the Committee for the
first session of the Committee's inquiry into the UK biodiversity
policy? May I just say that this morning we published all the
memoranda which were received on time? They are now available
in House of Commons Paper 441-II at a cost of £14.70 but
by this afternoon they should be on the web page so that it is
available, for anyone who wants to know what other people have
said, to read or look at on the web. May I ask you to introduce
yourselves for the record?
(Dr Greenwood) I am Jeremy Greenwood.
I am the Director of the British Trust for Ornithology whose business
is described in the opening bit of the written evidence we have
provided.
(Dr Vickery) I am Juliet Vickery. I am Head of the
Terrestrial Ecology Unit, also at the British Trust for Ornithology.
2. Do you want to say anything by way of introduction
or are you happy for us to go straight to questions?
(Dr Greenwood) May I just apologise for the length
of our written submission? It was written rather late in the day
and we did not have time to make it much shorter. I hope it has
not been too much.
Mr Donohoe
3. Sometimes it is better that way. May I ask
what you see as the greatest strengths in the UK's biodiversity
policy?
(Dr Greenwood) The fact that there is a plan is the
key strength. The fact that it drew in people from across government,
from local government, from NGOs, from business, not just the
businesses we traditionally associate with the countryside, which
is another important strength. It is based probably on better
information about biodiversity than there is anywhere else in
the world because we have such an interest in natural history
in this country and there are such large numbers of amateurs in
particular providing information, plus a strong academic background.
Also the fact that there are measurable targets in the plan is
a major strength.
4. What would you see as the greatest weakness?
(Dr Greenwood) That it seems to be driven by individual
action plans rather than a broad integrated vision. The individual
plans do not seem to have been drawn together into a coherent
package. It is not that they are particularly incoherent, it is
just that the cross-links between different action plans do not
seem to have been explored very well. The famous 59 steps go some
way towards this but there is a need for greater integration.
It seems, and this is very much the view of an observer rather
than an expert, that no-one in particular has a leadership role
in this business, that everybody has been drawn in, but it is
not clear who is responsible for driving the whole process forward.
Perhaps there is not enough joined-up government between government
departments; that is an impression of an observer. There is a
lack of funding.
5. Why do you say there is a lack of funding?
Surely everybody would say that?
(Dr Greenwood) Yes, but some of them would be right
in some circumstances and some not. A lot of the action plans
which have been drawn up are there with costings. The birds which
have been tackled so far, such as the corncrake, are species which
are rare and therefore the action which is needed is relatively
straightforward. When we come to the common but declining species
like the skylark, quite clearly the actions which will be required
will be costly actions. They are going to impact on the way in
which we do agriculture if we are going to do it properly. That
is going to cost a lot of money which has to be delivered somehow
and it is not clear to me that funding is available.
6. Would you say there is enough emphasis on
what goes on outside the special areas of interest in terms of
protection of the species?
(Dr Greenwood) I think not.
(Dr Vickery) Perhaps I could answer that with a specific
issue which is the farmland bird community and after all farmland
accounts for the vast majority of land in Britain. The agri-environment
schemes, the ESAs, arable stewardship are tremendous and they
are obviously delivering a lot of very important things for biodiversity
and are very valuable. They are crucial but there is a risk of
focusing too much on those options when you consider that the
vast majority of birds still depend very much on the cropped habitat.
Just to give you a quick example, if you consider the skylark,
of which about 40 per cent are nesting in cereals, in winter wheat,
because it is such a dominant land form, you can see that agri-environment
schemes covering small surface areas of that land might not make
a big difference. We do know that set-aside, which covered between
5 and 15 per cent of the land over ten years and was very good
for skylarks, had a relatively small effect on the population
level. If that is true of set-aside, which was after all virtually
compulsory, it may well be true of agri-environment schemes which
will also cover a relatively small area. These agri-environment
schemes need to be promoted alongside attention on how you perhaps
manage the cropped habitat less intensively, things like integrated
crop management, minimal tillage, those sorts of options and organic
farming which is also very valuable for birds.
7. If government were to take a role in this,
how would you see that being operated? They cannot regulate what
a farmer plants just to suit a skylark. We all like skylarks but
...
(Dr Vickery) For very many of these birds managing
for one will manage for very many of them, so you are addressing
a suite of needs. I am not an expert on policy so I could say
only broadly how those sorts of things might work. We have seen
that the redirection of price support, production subsidies for
farmers, has had a big effect and that kind of redirection of
funds, the sort of modulation which has already taken place, that
is the way to look at that cropped habitat and try to address
some of those problems as well.
Mr Benn
8. You said in answer to Mr Donohoe's earlier
question that there is a shortage of funds and yet the point you
were just making a moment ago really seems to be saying to us
that it is a redirection of funds, in particular funds from the
CAP, the way in which they are used, which can actually make the
biggest difference.
(Dr Greenwood) A lot of people would agree with that.
Farmers quite clearly are extremely expert in managing their land
in ways which maximise their income; they would not survive if
they were not. For over 50 years we have had a system in this
country which has directed the whole of agricultural support with
really quite minor exceptions towards production. It is up to
the community in general, the public and politicians, to decide
whether it wishes to redirect the emphasis of agriculture away
from just productivity of crops, towards environmental and social
benefits as well. Common observation of the behaviour of farmers
suggests that if that redirection happened, then what they planted
and the way in which they managed their crops would indeed be
modified in the directions we were intending.
Chairman
9. Is there a right number of skylarks to have
in this country?
(Dr Greenwood) That is a very interesting philosophical
question. My answer to it is that for every individual the right
number of birds to have in the country is the number they remember
when they were about 14. It is not a question which can be answered
scientifically. The fact is however that we know quite clearly
that in the last 25 or 30 years the number of birds on farmland,
which makes up the major land use in this country, has declined
very significantly. Some species have increased but the majority
have declined. There is less wildlife out there in the habitat
which is most common and which is the habitat which most people
see when they go out walking the dog or taking their children
for a countryside experience.
Mr Brake
10. Do you think that the mix is correct in
biodiversity action plans? Are we focusing perhaps too much on
the rare and omitting to concentrate a little bit on the common?
(Dr Vickery) I am going to talk again about the bird
side of it which is obviously our expertise. For birds that is
not true. The common species are very well represented in the
action plans and that is a reflection of the fact that because
we have this tremendous long-term data, thanks to the volunteers
and amateurs who have collected a lot of it, we know a great deal
about those common species, so we know about the population trends
and the distribution. It has been relatively easy to see that
they are a problem and to include them. For birds that is not
the case, although I suspect it probably is for a number of other
taxa about which we know relatively little even of the rare species,
let alone the abundant ones. For birds that is not a problem.
For the habitats, again the broad suite of habitats which is included
both in the costed action plans and statements, cover a huge range
and it is a very good selection. I should just say again on the
farmland bird side of things that the only problem is that, let
us take for example grassland, the targeted habitats of things
like hay meadows are obviously very important, very species rich
and very valuable, but a number of the common widespread farmland
birds will not have their population trends stemmed or even reversed
simply by addressing hay meadows. They are dependent on the much
broader neutral grasslands being managed now for silage and livestock
production. That is the only problem with the action plans, that
they perhaps miss some of the broader habitats which also need
to be addressed; possibly through other mechanisms rather than
action plans themselves, but that is an important thing to remember.
11. Certainly your view is that it is important
to look at both the common and the rare and that the action plans
should reflect both.
(Dr Vickery) Yes; definitely.
12. What do you think the Government's priorities
should be for furthering biodiversity and meeting its international
obligations?
(Dr Greenwood) The major problem of the last third
of a century has been the decline in farmland birds. The evidence
which is available for other groups suggests that they have also
declined on farmland. Whereas the reasons for the decline are,
no doubt, indeed we have evidence, specific to individual species,
there are linkages across species, there are similarities across
species and we can say, putting it generally, that it is because
we have intensified agriculture. If you like, man is taking more
out of the land and there is less and less available for wildlife.
Wildlife used to feed on the leftovers and wildlife was a robber
from man and is increasingly less so because of intensification.
That means that the priority really has to be focused on looking
at the management of farmland, the way in which the nation manages
its farmlands. That is not the only problem. There are increasing
signs of evidence of problems with woodland birds and I have to
say the research evidence there is almost completely lacking.
We know very little about the reasons for the decline of some
woodland birds.
13. One thing you mentioned earlier was the
lack of a champion for biodiversity in the UK. Are you calling
for—I hate the term—a biodiversity czar?
(Dr Greenwood) That is really the policy/management
issue which the BTO would not have a view on. It does seem to
me that there is a lack of somebody to take hold of the reins
or conduct the orchestra or whatever analogy you like. Perhaps
it is a czar, yes.
14. Presumably that would be someone in government.
(Dr Greenwood) That is up to government I suppose,
but I should have thought that it was really only likely to operate
if government were seen to put its commitment behind it.
15. What do you think of the UK's implementation
of the Habitats and Birds Directives?
(Dr Greenwood) In comparison with most countries we
are doing pretty well. However, we must remember that the situation
is constantly changing. We should not be complacent. Populations
of wildlife are continually changing and we must continue to keep
ahead of the game there. There are two deficiencies which I would
identify; one of them is specific to the Birds Directive. We have
brilliant systems in this country for monitoring bird populations
and their habitats but there is one element which we do not have
and that is a system for monitoring of hunting bags. This means
that there is a key piece of information when it comes to managing
hunted populations which are covered by the Directive, which we
do not have. That is one problem.
Chair
16. I am sorry, I do not understand that. Can
you explain?
(Dr Greenwood) The Directive states that populations
of birds which are hunted should be—I cannot tell you the
exact wording—properly managed. One of the key elements
to knowing whether we are managing them properly is to know how
many we are actually killing. In this country we do not have those
sorts of records, although in very many other European countries
those data are collected centrally. It is part of the licensing
system in many countries. In order to get a licence you have to
put in your bag return for the previous season. That is a key
piece of information. The other area, in relation to our position
within Europe on this, is that we seem to have missed opportunities
to keep the lead. We in Britain have the potential for really
leading in Europe on this because of the tremendous interest and
the good data and good science which underpin our work on biodiversity
in this country. A few years ago we lost the headquarters of Wetlands
International to the Netherlands, we lost the headquarters of
the European Secretariat of Birdlife to the Netherlands; the Dutch
Government offered them extremely favourable terms. One organisation,
the European Bird Census Council, with which I have had something
to do in the past and is the sort of European equivalent of the
BTO, is virtually a shadow because it has no support from any
governments. It strikes me that is an area where the UK Government
could show some commitment here, putting Britain into the lead
by supporting that organisation in particular.
17. I understand that the UK Government is in
trouble from the EU on the basis that as far as the Habitats Directive
is concerns we have not designated enough areas. It was implied
to us when the Committee was in Brussels last week that unless
we come up with more areas being notified under the Directive,
they might start to restrict development aid, things like that.
Do you have any comments on that?
(Dr Greenwood) No, I do not. It is not something I
know enough about.
Mr Blunt
18. In answer to an earlier question about the
right number of skylarks you made reference to the countryside
experience for people and walking the dogs. Is that the most important
reason for keeping a biodiverse population?
(Dr Greenwood) It is one reason. I should not like
to make a judgement about what is the most important matter for
individual people to judge. There are others.
19. What in your judgement is the most important
reason for sustaining biodiversity?
(Dr Greenwood) I would say there are three reasons:
one of them is the experience that people have of biodiversity
of wildlife. Another is an ethical or a moral reason: we do have
a responsibility to the world around us, perhaps particularly
to the living world. The third is—whether this applies to
the skylark in particular I do not know—that as time goes
by we constantly find that there are elements of biodiversity
which are of particular significance to us such as plants which
turn out to be sources of drugs. More generally, the whole ecosystem,
the whole natural machine, delivers to us what are known technically
as ecosystem services, like purification of water and the purification
of the atmosphere and so on and so forth. The estimates which
have been made of the value of that to the human economy really
make the human economy pale into insignificance by the side of
the natural world. If you like, we have to regard ourselves as
part of that whole, which is delivering our way of life to us,
rather than something to be dominated as a small sector of our
lives.
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