Memorandum submitted by Natural England
1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 Natural England is a new organisation
which has been established under the Natural Environment and Rural
Communities Act 2006. It is a non-departmental public body. It
has been formed by bringing together English Nature and parts
of the Rural Development Service and the Countryside Agency.
1.2 Natural England has been charged with
the responsibility to ensure that England's unique natural environment
including its flora and fauna, land and seascapes, geology and
soils are protected and improved.
1.3 Natural England's purpose as outlined
in the Act is to ensure that the natural environment is conserved,
enhanced, and managed for the benefit of present and future generations,
thereby contributing to sustainable development.
2. SUMMARY OF
NATURAL ENGLAND'S
RESPONSE
2.1 Natural England's strategic role is
to conserve and enhance the natural environment for its intrinsic
value, the wellbeing and enjoyment of people and the economic
prosperity to be derived from it. Ensuring that the natural environment
is managed in this way for the benefit of present and future generations
allows us to contribute to sustainable development. Ensuring that
future generations can enjoy England's rich geology, landscapes
and biodiversity requires us to significantly improve the protection
and management of what we have today. In many countries tourism
is based upon the enjoyment of the natural environment whilst
carefully protecting the resource from harmful practices and exploitation.
2.2 The natural environment needs to be
properly and fully valued so that whilst enjoying it people can
not only understand it more but also actively contribute to its
care and conservation. Evidence from the latest England Day Visit
Leisure Survey (2005) that 1.26 billion trips are made to the
countryside each year with visitors spending £9.7 billion
on such visits without creating too many unacceptable problems.
However, there is a great opportunity to build on this interest
in wildlife and natural beauty from a tourism perspective because
one third of the population never visits the countryside at all.
This represents a potential market segment of several billion
pounds and the opportunity to engage people in physical activity
such as walking and cycling. An emphasis on physical activity
in the natural environment without harming it will both improve
health and wellbeing as well as offering climate change and economic
benefits as part of a future low carbon economy.
2.3 Enabling the natural environment to
support these public goods will require many partnerships such
as our proposal to reduce the transport impact of nature based
tourism. We will work with Government to increase coastal access
and improve National Nature Reserves and National Trails to connect
those people with currently low access from towns, cities and
areas of social deprivation. We will seek partners to develop
on-line information and promotional capability to illustrate the
full spectrum of outdoor recreation possibilities for everyone
to enjoy.
2.4 Natural England will seek to ensure
that tourism can develop in a manner that protects and enhances
the natural environment and any related tourism uses do not adversely
exploit it. We will seek to influence the tourism market to adopt
more sustainable practices and cut greenhouse gas emissions particularly
in relation to food production and transport.
2.5 We will work with the Government and
planning authorities to ensure that the natural environment is
properly protected and enhanced in all future tourism development
proposals and develop a framework for assessing the cumulative
impact of development on it.
2.6 We will address climate change and see
a relationship with the tourism industry as particularly important
in debating what our future natural environment should be like
adapting to climate change.
The remainder of this response follows the format
of questions in the consultation relevant to Natural England.
Theme. The challenges and opportunities for the
domestic and inbound tourism industries, including cheap flights
abroad and their impact on traditional tourism resorts
3.1 Natural England has a role in developing
places of high environmental quality and promoting them for public
enjoyment both as visitors and tourists. We do this through: managing
our own estate of National Nature Reserves; seeking the designation
and creation of National Trails as well as maintaining the current
suite of routes; regulating the access lands created by the Countryside
and Rights of Way Act 2000; encouraging access and educational
access schemes on agri-environment land; supporting our relationship
with Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty, National Parks and other
land holding conservation partners; and, working with local authorities
and regional tourism partners to support Rights of Way Improvement
Plans in ways that benefit recreational walking, cycling and horse-riding.
3.2 Major domestic tourism challenges in
recent decades have included the depth of market penetration for
outdoors recreation in England and the ability to create sustainable
tourism use of the natural environment. It is as yet uncertain
what the impacts of climate change will be on the future of the
natural environment but Natural England will be working towards
adaptation with a number of partners and assessing the positive
and negative impacts as our knowledge and understanding increases
over time.
3.3 VisitEngland has worked with Natural
England and its predecessor bodies to develop viable alternatives
with attention being given to our premier walking, riding and
cycling routes including the family of National Trails, conservation
landscapes, nature reserves owned by wildlife trusts, heritage
features and the coast. Much of this work has been aimed at off-peak
use as a means of re-introducing the tourism "offer"
from the natural and historic environment. VisitEngland and Natural
England have worked strenuously to produce exceptional promotional
material such as the "Outdoor England" brochure and
the related website. Experimental schemes based on wildlife attractions
such as the red squirrel population on the Isle of Wight and local
tourism accommodation providers (a "Gift for Nature"
scheme) have raised awareness of the relationship between the
natural environment and tourism but not a great deal of money.
Unlike statutory conservation tourism taxes such as the Great
Barrier Reef, for instance, all UK schemes have been based on
voluntary donations only.
3.4 The opportunity now exists to do more
in tourism market segmentation terms to promote the natural environment
as a place for healthy exercise, conservation or activity experiences
and sustainable resource use (whether for low carbon leisure transport,
local food or environmentally friendly accommodation). In particular,
the Natural England Board's recommendations to the Government
to create a linear right of access around the coast of England
should assist the tourism industry and DCMS to create a new and
exciting offer to domestic tourism over the next ten years if
implementation is approved by Parliament. Natural England and
VisitEngland could work closely with other providers to ensure
that maximum public benefits can be achieved through a blend of
promotion of low carbon access, activity and natural environment
experiences to create places that domestic and overseas tourists
want to visit and increase economic value without adversely affecting
them.
3.5 A summary. We have three broad points:
— We should support the challenges
presented by a future low carbon tourism economy and address concerns
about our capacity for "One Planet Living" in terms
that stimulate economic interests without harming the conservation
of the natural environment.
— We should support more outdoor
recreational activity and nature based tourism provided that it
is sustainable because interaction with it will improve the health
and wellbeing of people.
— We should recognise that simply
providing places for people to enjoy the natural environment as
tourists or visitors is not sufficient to include and encourage
those who currently have low access or never go there at all and
further collaborative work with the tourism industry on promotion
of such aspects of sustainable tourism is needed.
Theme. The practicality of promoting more environmentally
friendly forms of tourism
4.1 The three main aims of Natural England's
project to reduce the transport impact of nature-based tourism
are: firstly, to develop and encourage the take-up of more sustainable
options for leisure travel with a special focus on nature-based
tourism and high profile National Nature Reserves; secondly, to
provide more information on and interpretation of the natural
environment for transport users to increase their understanding,
enjoyment and appreciation of the natural environment and, thirdly,
to raise awareness of the impacts of people's travel patterns
and behaviour.
4.2 The desired outcomes of this project
are: firstly a modal shift resulting in reduced transport related
environmental impacts from nature based tourism, especially from
greenhouse gas emissions; and, secondly, an improved understanding
of those undertaking leisure visits of their impacts and means
of reducing them
4.3 Through the project Natural England
can develop policy, technical guidance, advice on best practice
as well as sharing evidence in part gleaned from pilots and demonstrations.
We can offer the results of practical work carried out by the
founding bodies such as the shuttle bus service to Stiperstones
NNR; the accreditation scheme for marine wildlife viewing from
boats such as WiSe (Wildlife Safe); or the solar powered tourism
boat in use in Chichester Harbour AONB. The Best of Both Worlds
project also shows how nature conservation and access concerns
can be reconciled even in the most sensitive of environments
4.4 Central to more environmentally friendly
forms of tourism is the ability to promote low carbon transport
either to tourism destinations or local travel once there. It
is not always possible to use low carbon transport directly from
the doorstep although it is usually possible to access the National
Cycle Network within a few miles by bicycle or the National Trails
via trains and buses. Combinations of walking and cycling are
possible with public transport almost anywhere although the train
operating companies do not offer a consistent nor easy to understand
service to cyclists. Some disused railway lines have been re-engineered
as "safe" off road family oriented routes such as the
hugely successful Tarka Trail at Barnstaple or the Camel Trail
at Padstow. Even in places with no tradition of tourism, such
as Sunderland or Workington, the Sea to Sea (C2C) project has
stimulated local economic success by inviting cyclists to undertake
the challenge of cycling across "the backbone of England".
Equally important has been inspirational promotion, good signage,
clear means of access at either end of the rail network and traffic
free sections. Equestrians have access to a number of long distance
recreational routes including the Pennine Bridleway, South Downs
Way and the western part of the Ridgeway that also provides special
stabling facilities such as those at the YHA youth hostel near
Wantage. Most equestrian tourism is provided by rides and hacks
from local stables in tourist areas.
4.5 We know from the evidence of the England
Day Leisure Visits Survey that recreational use of the countryside
is declining overall and this downward trend has increased in
magnitude. The reasons for this are complex and relate to social
and economic changes as much as leisure choice. This trend is
not unexpected as society becomes more sedentary, car focussed
and enticed by virtual indoor experiences such as computer gaming.
However, it is clear where outdoor facilities are stimulating
and accessible, such as the Eden Project or the National Cycle
Network (trips on the NCN increased by 173% between 2000 and 2005),
that this trend is not universal.
4.6 A summary. We have two broad points:
— We should work with the tourism
industry to reduce the transport impacts of nature based tourism
and progressively engineer a modal shift to less environmentally
damaging forms of transportation such as walking or cycling in
combination with public transport.
— We should promote the economic
and environmental success of environmentally friendly forms of
tourism with the industry and increase the potential for walking,
cycling, horse riding and other forms of high exercise but low
carbon activity taking place without damage.
Theme. How to derive maximum benefit for the industry
from the 2012 Games
5.1 Natural England will work with the Olympics
project to not only restore substantial areas of habitat and minimise
the ecological footprint of holding the games but also to secure
a lasting recreational legacy. This recreational element will
involve permanent features that enhance not only the tourism offer
but more importantly could bring long term social, health and
environmental benefits to some of London's poorest wards. The
design and landscaping of the 2012 Games sites could further our
target to connect people to accessible natural greenspace within
300 metres of their homes. This Access to Natural Greenspace project
will be piloted in London in the period leading up to the Games
in 2012.
5.2 A lasting recreational legacy of greenways
for walking and cycling access to the Games will also encourage
permanent utilitarian use leading to greater health and wellbeing
for years to come in some of the most deprived parts of London.
5.3 Although Natural England has not yet completed
its walking, cycling and natural greenspace proposals, a range
of other bodies such as Sustrans have published costed proposals
for a network of traffic free greenways, tree lined and traffic
calmed streets. These measures would make the Games: low carbon:
improve health (exemplifying the Olympic bid ideal of `active
spectators'); improve social inclusion; and, increase neighbourhood
renewal (by linking public spaces and adding biodiversity to the
urban fabric of some of London's most built up areas)
5.5. A summary. We have two broad points:
— The Olympic Games 2012 should
produce a lasting recreational legacy for London whilst restoring
substantial areas of habitat and minimising its ecological footprint.
We will work with the Olympic authorities, the tourism industry
and others to achieve this aim; and
— Our support for the Games will
focus on those aspects of the creation of a new public realm that
supports the natural environment and society. We will be particularly
interested in the provision or regeneration of accessible natural
greenspace and inspirational new walking and cycling facilities
in an area of high social deprivation.
March 2007
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