Status of project "Sustainable conservation on Hungarian Natura 2000 sites" SH/4/8 implementation, 2015

Wed, 03/23/2016 - 00:00

The overall delivery of the project is in line with the former plans. Monitoring methodologies are under the approval procedure by the Ministry of Agriculture, while field data collection also proceeded in 2015. The amount of area covered with new, good quality biodiversity data available has expanded significantly (sum: 966000 ha).

Public debate of the 12 Natura 2000 sites carried out successfully (April - Kiskunság; July - Mátra). Besides the documents made available through the project website (http://natura.2000.hu/hu/csoportok/projektblog/matrai-fenntartasi-tervek-elso-koros-egyeztetese), informational material has also been handed out for forum participants. Forums were followed by the interest of local media (http://www.kiskorostv.hu/hirek.php?hirid=1653).
Management planning procedure provides input to on-the-spot habitat management of the pilot sites in ACT4. Baseline monitoring actions finished in the pilot areas, the first reports are ready for both Mátra and Kiskunság areas. Data transfer between the project and the Nature Conservation Information System is under development.

Project external communication activities have massively broadened. All biodiversity related projects financed by Swiss-Hungarian Cooperation Programme presented their results on the conference organized by the project as a side-event of the I. International Nature Film Festival in Gödöllő, 15/05/2015 (http://natura.2000.hu/hu/csoportok/projektblog/termeszetvedelmi-tamogatasok-svajcbol). Intensive communication actions were carried out aiming farm advisors to prepare the financing possibilities of agri-environment payments encouraged by the project by the policy recommendation published in 2013. 1700 experts were directly trained and high quality information materials were published (written, designed and printed by the project) in order to change the negative trends of agriculture biodiversity. Following the idea of the already published "Field guide for farmland birds", the first manuscripts of field guides for fish farmers and forest owners are ready, finalization of the booklets is planned in PIR8. While the first booklet focused on agricultural habitats, the ones under development focus of fishponds and forests. Scientific communication is considered as one of the most significant strength of the project.

Mid-term-audit report has been submitted to Intermediate Body and after the necessary corrections this was approved in February 2015 by the IB. The mid-term report was finally approved on the 22/05/2016. On-site-visit of the project was carried out by Széchenyi Program Office on 02/07/2015,  where the overall project status was considered favourable. Prolongation of the project with 2 months was requested by the Executive Agency, which was approved through the 3rd modification of Implementation Agreement (30/10/2015). Indicator contribution further proceeded in terms of several logframe indicators.

All professional reports and indicator verification documents, publications and other outputs of the project are available at project website (http://natura.2000.hu/hu/filedepot).