Croatia

The Neretva Delta region is a predominantly rural area of approximately 20,000 hectares, shared by Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. The region supports the livelihoods of approximately 60,000 people living in nine municipalities - seven on the Croatian side and two in Bosnia and Herzegovina. This study represents the preliminary assessment analysis of one of the six project sites of the project “Environment for People in the Dinaric Arc”.

This study explores the possibilities and challenges of the existing regional collaboration between Plitvice Lakes National Park in Croatia and Una National Park in Bosnia and Herzegovina, one of six pilot sites in the project “Environment for People in the Dinaric Arc”. The objective of the study is to survey the possibilities for transboundary conservation, i.e. establishment of transboundary protected areas and associated cooperation mechanisms.

This publication aims to further raise awareness about the value of transboundary conservation, highlighting the many benefits transboundary cooperation generates, while not neglecting the challenges and problems parties encounter when they engage in transboundary initiatives.

This publication reflects on and reinforces the lessons and experience of undertaking transboundary conservation programmes and sets out some existing and new guidance for those involved. It proposes a diagnostic approach to determining what the underlying purpose is for the transboundary initiative, and to guide the practitioner to respond to this purpose and need when the programme is designed and implemented.

Protected Landscapes are a strong option for biodiversity conservation in human-influenced landscapes and seascapes. They often contain threatened or endemic species. There is now also a growing interest in the nature conservation benefits of protected landscapes. But do protected landscapes really protect wild biodiversity? The case studies collected here launch an investigation into wild biodiversity.