‘We stand at a pivotal moment’
It’s now more than a year on since the publication of the Glover Review of Protected Landscapes, a report grounded in a deep love of landscape and strong support for National Parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The report underlined the fact that the National Park was on the right track in most of our key areas – including engaging with young people and underrepresented communities, improving accessibility and tackling the biodiversity emergency. However, we know much more remains to be done to address the long-term challenges facing all protected landscapes.
Earlier this year we published the Partnership Management Plan, which brings together environmental organisations, land managers, farmers, community organisations, communities, businesses and volunteers, and sets out the ten ambitious outcomes we want to achieve over the next five years. Two crucial ambitions are to help nature recover and to connect everyone with nature for the benefit of both nature and people. These are two of the most important recommendations of the
Glover Protected Landscape review.
It’s certainly been a very busy year across all strands of the authority’s work, including ramping up nature recovery, holding successful virtual events, delivering schools engagement, improving accessibility for all, and inspiring projects to engage families right across the region with the wonderful benefits of the National Park.
We’ve been working incredibly hard to address recommendations in the Glover Review, building on the strong foundation we already had and also devising new innovative ways to extend our impact and influence. We are, however, disappointed that one year on the Government has not yet produced a response to the Glover Review. Our hope is that this will be coming very soon. We stand at a pivotal moment. In these challenging times, access to green space is needed more than ever and the global biodiversity emergency is now firmly on the public agenda. The Covid-19 pandemic has seen people from all areas re-connect with nature, giving many a new appreciation of how just valuable it is to our health and wellbeing. Now is the time to make the most of this renewed enthusiasm.