05.02.10 - EPA Publishes Biodiversity Action Plan
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has published its Biodiversity Action Plan, to coincide with World Wetlands Day. The theme for World Wetlands Day this year is Wetlands,
Biodiversity and Climate Change.
Launching the report, Dr. Mary Kelly, EPA Director General said: “For its relatively small size Ireland has a wide diversity of habitats ranging from peatlands to coastal lagoons. These habitats are internationally renowned and support a high level of biodiversity that is increasingly under threat.
While many people now understand the threats to society and the planet posed by global climate change, the threats posed by loss of biodiversity are less commonly understood. But human wellbeing is dependent on ‘ecosystem services’ provided to us by nature, for free. For example, water and air purification, fisheries, timber, nutrient cycling, floodwater storage
and recreational facilities. It is therefore of vital importance that such reservoirs of biodiversity are protected.”
The EPA’s Biodiversity Action Plan presents an explicit action plan for the implementation of its role in the protection of biodiversity. The Plan covers a range of activities in the areas of monitoring, research, assessment and reporting, environmental regulation, climate change and management and communications.
The Plan outlines a wide range of significant actions, which will be undertaken by the EPA in
relation to the protection of Ireland’s biodiversity, thus underlining the substantial support role undertaken by the Agency in this area.
Source: EPA
For more information please visit www.epa.ie
