Nature protection and biodiversity - National Responses (Belgium)

At the national level, the National Biodiversity Strategy 2006-2016, adopted in October 2006, was developed as a direct response to Article 6 of the Convention on Biological Diversity. It is the first document on biodiversity that is applicable both at federal and regional levels.

The strategy spells out a range of priority objectives to anticipate, prevent and reduce the causes of biodiversity loss in Belgium. It also aims to (i) implement the Convention on Biodiversity, (ii) reach the 2010 target set out by the EU (halt the loss of biodiversity in Europe by 2010) and (iii) provide an integrated national response to the numerous treaties and agreements on biodiversity to which Belgium is a party.

More information available on: http://www.biodiv.be/implementation/strategy-be

Integration of biodiversity in sectoral activities

In November 2009, the federal government adopted the Federal Plan for the Sectoral Integration of Biodiversity. This plan is one of the government contributions to the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity and to the implementation of Belgium’s National Biodiversity Strategy 2006-2016.

The plan focuses on four key sectors at the federal level: economy, development cooperation, science policy and transport. The objective is to better integrate biodiversity concerns in the activities of these sectors. This sectoral integration of biodiversity should not be restricted to a limited number of sectors, hence this plan is to be seen as a first step in this approach.

More information available on: http://www.biodiv.be/implementation/laws-policies/policies/federal/biodiv-plan

Protected areas

An overall total surface area for protected areas (PAs) cannot be given, since surfaces of PAs of several types overlap, wholly or partially.

The total Natura 2000 surface area in the terrestrial zone comes to 12.6 % of Belgium. In the marine zone about 12 % of the Belgian territorial sea and its exclusive economic zone is designated as Natura 2000.

The demarcation of the protected areas, which are summarised in Table 2, is embedded in regional policies aimed at countering the loss of biodiversity (except for the federal marine protected areas). Hence the response to biodiversity loss is described on a regional level below.

Table 2: Overview of the numbers and surface area of various types of protected areas (Source: National Focal Point of Belgium for the Convention on Biological Diversity (2009), p96 – revised according to recent changes)

Designated protected areas

In Belgium there are no special targets requiring protected areas to cover a minimum percentage of the ecological regions. However, the EU Habitats Directive and Birds Directive include qualitative targets for the designation of protected areas for the listed endangered species and habitats in Belgium.