Linking PanEuropean Land Cover Change to Pressures on

Linking Pan-European Land Cover Change to Pressures on Biodiversity FP-V Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) Background BIOPRESS aims at providing decision makers with quantitative information on how changing landcover/use has affected the environment and biodiversity in Europe. The project is currently producing historical (1950 – 2000) land cover change information in and around Natura 2000 sites which will be converted into information on pressures on biodiversity. The product is aimed at the EU-user community concerned with the impact of land cover/use changes on the environment and biodiversity. Our main stakeholder is the European Environment Agency and its topic centres (ETCNPB and ETC-TE). Other users are DG Environment, the GMES project LADAMER, National conservation agencies and Regional and local authorities responsible for Natura 2000 sites. Objectives Window location Phase-I (Jan. 2003 – June 2004 ): Land cover change (1950 – 1990) in and around a representative stratified sample of Natura 2000 sites. • Change matrices through backdating CORINE Land Cover 1990 with aerial photos of 1950’ies for ~100 windows (30 km x 30 km) centred on Natura 2000 sites • Change matrices through photo-to-photo interpretation of aerial photos of 1950’ies and 1990’ies for ~50 Transects (15 x 2 km) at Natura 2000 sites. 182 Annex-I habitats are found in the windows of which 120 found at least 10 times Phase –II (June 2004 – Dec. 2005) • • Converting Land cover into pressures on biodiversity Setup GIS framework to facilitate the integration of pan-European data sets Link Land cover change to main pressures on biodiversity: intensification, abandonment, afforestation, urbanisation. Study of error propagation through all stages. Develop a pan-European land cover 1990 -2000 and beyond monitoring concept for areas in and around Natura 2000 sites and based on the integration of CORINE Land Cover, Earth observation and field data. Windows (30 km x 30 km) Transects (15 x 2 km) Belgium: Zaventem airport Shrub and woodlands Spain: from least intensive (Nature 2000 site) to most intensive Change matrix Landsat TM with CORINE LC 1990 1950 aerial photographs with Interpreted CORINE LC 1950 Town CORINE LC 1956 CORINE land cover 1990 CORINE LC 1998 CORINE land cover 1950 CORINE land cover legend Change matrix 1956 Visible aerial photo areas = areas of land cover change (1950 -90) Contact: France Gerard CEH Monks Wood, Abbots Ripton PE 28 2 LS, Cambridgeshire, UK ffg@ceh. ac. uk Tel: +44 (0) 1487 772400 Fax: +44 (0) 1487 773467 1998