Since 2008, the EU has supported the development of a number of Species Action Plans for selected species protected under the Habitats Directive. One of these addressed the conservation of the Danube Clouded Yellow butterfly (Colias myrmidone). These plans provide information about the status, ecology, threats and current conservation measures for each species and list the key actions that are required to improve their conservation status across their range within the EU. Each plan is the result of an extensive process of consultation with individual experts in Europe as well as competent Member States' authorities.
Through the EU Pollinators Initiative, the Commission has advanced the development of action plans for the most threatened pollinator species and habitats:
- EU Action plan to maintain and restore to favourable conservation status the habitat type 6210 Semi-natural dry grasslands and scrubland facies on calcareous substrates (FestucoBrometalia)
- EU Action plan to maintain and restore to favourable conservation status the habitat type 4030 European dry heaths
- Work on three Species Action Plans for the conservation of most threatened pollinator species in the EU will start by the end of 2020
The Commission will support Member States and stakeholders in implementing them, including through the LIFE Programme.
Development of new Species Action Plans
The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), in collaboration with experts from the IUCN Species Survival Commission, in particular the Invertebrate Conservation Committee and the Hoverfly Specialist Group, as well as Buglife, have started working on the production of Action Plans for conservation of threatened pollinator species in the EU.
The Action Plans are being developed in the framework of an EU funded project which started in April 2021 and will run for two years. The work taps into an important IUCN knowledge product – it will follow the Guidelines for Species Conservation Planning (IUCN SSC 2017), developed by IUCN SSC Conservation Planning Specialist Group (CPSG).
Out of fifteen shortlisted Action Plans, the highest ranked three proposals will be developed through this project:
- Canary Islands multi-species action plan
- Veteran Trees Specialist action plan
- Teasel Bee multi-species action plan
All shortlisted proposals can be found in the below report.
Species Action Plan report
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Download report (PDF)