Europe

Red Lists are valuable for informing species protection policy and are important as indicators as well as a tool for communication between all those involved in species protection. There are some 3,700 Red Lists in use across Europe, but the approach, aims and criteria used vary widely. A partial result of this is that Red List Species are rarely used for European ecological networks and play a modest role in the updating of the Wild Birds and Habitats directives.

The rationale for this three-volume work covering nearly 250 major sites for conservation of plant diversity worldwide is concern about rapid global loss and degradation of natural ecosystems. By highlighting areas of prime botanical importance, it is hoped that their conservation will be ensured by an adequate commitment of resources. Selection of the sites is based both on floristic statistics and on detailed first-hand knowledge of numerous botanists.

The IUCN system for classifying protected areas distinguishes six management categories (I-VI). This publication aims to further clarify how they can be interpreted within Europe, in order to help protected areas managers and others concerned with protected areas to apply the IUCN system more consistently to ensure reliable categorisation and data gathering.

The title of this trilingual (Polish, English and German) publication refers to the theme of an international conference held in Poland in March 2002. Organic farming was presented at the conference as the most sustainable form of active environment conservation and an important element of rural development. Included in the document is a collection of papers presented at the conference with the final paper being the "Warsaw Declaration".