"I would state that for me this exchange was a great success. Not only did we get exposed to different types of thinking in terms of ecosystem management but we saw how Bulgaria is ahead of the UK in some ways in protected management."
"Kudos must go out to Velis who made this trip an inspirational experience."
The trip to Bulgaria was organised by ARCH Trainer Exchange for eight participants who work in the fields of ecosystem conservation and environmental management in Scotland and England. The group left London Gatwick Airport on Friday July 4th and returned on Thursday July 10th 2008. Accommodation was in various locations throughout Bulgaria’s central mountainous region starting in Sofia on the first night, followed by 2 nights in a small village of Cherni Ossam, 2 nights in Etara and the final night in Kalofer. The accommodation ranged from large hotels in Sofia to small family run rural hotels in the villages. The accommodation was suitable for the purpose and in most cases was excellent.
The project was entirely funded by the Leonardo da Vinci Nature Exchange programme which covered the costs of travel, admission costs and accommodation all participants.
Participants
Ross Preston - Ecological Consultant,
Julia Baston - Conservation Advisor - Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group ,
Fiona Cruickshank – Area Officer - Scottish Natural Heritage,
Katrina Marsden Policy Officer – RSPB,
Neil Groves – Assistant Warden – RSPB
Paul Leadbitter – Project Manager – North Pennines AONB Partnership
Paul Collin – Reserves Manager (Retired) - RSPB
Jane Richard – Education Officer - RSPB
The main reason I was interested in going on this exchange was to try and understand and assess how a country like Bulgaria who has just entered into the European Union manages its ecosystem and how they view the role of protected areas in the landscape. Some of this was answered by Professor Stoyan Stoyanov at the University of
Forestry in Sofia (Figure 1).
Figure 1. Professor Stoyan Stoyanov
The country of Bulgaria is 110,910 km2 making it less than half the size of the United Kingdom and with a population of approximately 7.6 million it has one of the lowest population densities in Europe. In terms of biodiversity Bulgaria has over 400 species of birds and 100 species of mammals all except a small minority are in a protected status of some sort. With about one third of Bulgaria covered in contiguous forest, habitats still exist that can maintain large mammals such as brown bear, grey wolf, and jackal. With such a forest resource made of mainly of oak, pine, ash, poplar, willow, beech and spruce Bulgaria’s relationship to the forest is important economically and culturally.
The forest industry in Bulgaria has traditionally been important to the economy not only in terms of timber but also hunting and tourism. However with this new EU state’s economy emerging it will be interesting to see how continued protection of intact ecosystem and protected areas play a role in this expansion. Most of the commercial forestry that happens in Bulgaria occurs on land owned by the state, private landowners are able to cut forest but under legislation that guides cutting and protects the forest resource. The forest is divided into units with each unit having a forest management plan to ensure a sustainable approach to cutting. Interestingly no clear cuts are allowed, which is something quite different to many of the other big forestry countries such as Canada, Russia and the United States.
When a question was put to Professor Stoyano about how high priority conservation was in Bulgaria he described conservation as being a ‘half-way’ priority for Bulgaria right now and anticipated it becoming more of a priority in the future. With respect to hunting only 15% of hunting lands were controlled by the state with the remained in private hunting association hands. Professor Stoyano stated that poaching was still a big problem for some species such as wolf and bear and that a lack of ecological understanding in hunters was the biggest challenge they had.
The context that Professor Stoyan Stoyanov provided was an excellent baseline by which to understand protected area selection, design and thinking in this new EU country. This understanding was developed more by a visit to the Central Balkan National Park. Upon meeting with park managers we were told that the Park contains rare and endangered wildlife species and communities, naturally occurring ecosystems of diversity, as well as historical sites of global cultural and scientific significance. At 72,000 hectares it is one of the largest IUCN (International Union for the conservation of Nature) category 2 protected areas in Europe. Category 2 parks are amongst the highest levels of protection not allowing forestry operations, road building, mineral extraction, hydro-electric development and in some cases human access to the site.
The Central Balkan National Park was established in 1991 to conserve the unique natural scenery and heritage of this area and protect the customs and livelihood of the local population. The Park Directorate, a regional body of the Ministry of the Environment and Waters manages the Park. The park and its eight nature reserves (Figure 2) are on the United Nations List of Representative Protected Areas, and four of its nature reserves are included in the World Network of Biosphere Reserves.
Figure 2. Map of Central Balkan National Park, showing its 8 nature reserves
It is interesting to note that countries like Scotland, England and Wales who are wealthier countries and have been in the EU for far longer than Bulgaria do not have anything close to this kind of protection or area in their respective protected areas systems. Protected areas established for wilderness protection such as Category 2 have a greater ecological value than most of the protected areas in the UK. These category 2 sites are areas where natural succession, and other process of nature are allowed to advance and stop as dictated by random natural events with no or little interference from humans.
In the UK there is a very conservative view of nature in that we are constantly trying to keep ecosystems in a stasis so that arbitrary objectives of numbers and types of species can be met and maintained. The Bulgarian view of protected areas and land management is a refreshing change and shows how the EU legislation does let member countries interpret and implement guidelines according to cultural values. This for me is the most important and significant piece of knowledge I gained from this trip and was exactly what I was trying to find out from visiting Bulgaria. There will be opportunities from this to influence thinking in the UK about the role of protected areas and the role of ecosystems.
The organisation I work for in northern England is the North Pennines Area of Outstanding Beauty which is a category 5 protected area and we are in the midst of writing our next 10 year management plan. A category 5 protected areas such as an AONB is an area of land, where the interaction of people and nature over time has produced an area of distinct character with significant aesthetic, ecological and/or cultural value, and often with high biological diversity. Safeguarding the integrity of this traditional interaction is vital to the protection, maintenance and evolution of such an area. There is an opportunity to shape this management plan with some of the concepts brought back from Bulgaria which will hopefully lead to more protection of this landscape.
At the Central Balkan National Park we also had the opportunity to hike up to an alpine pasture to view a community based sheep farm project and discuss and understand how locals make a living grazing sheep in the mountains. Our group took about an hour to reach the pasture which was at about 1700 metres (Figure 3).
Figure 3. Alpine Sheep Grazing Pasture
The path up to the pasture took us through young beech forest that was essentially unmanaged and was very natural and diverse. Near the Pleven chalet on the alpine pasture we sat down with one of the sheep graziers and discussed how this business worked. The sheep farm belongs to a local cooperative who have a 10 year lease and contract for sheep grazing the land of the pasture. Covering about 200 hectares some 2,100 sheep are moved up to the pasture in the summer months to graze and spend the winter months in the lowlands. In the 1956’s under the communist government some 30,000 sheep grazed the same land, so stocking levels while still high compared to the UK have dropped significantly since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1989. As part of this business each of the sheep owners gets 5 kg of sheep milk cheese which is made on the pasture using simple methods (Figure 4). The cheese is not sold but rather part of the product of the sheep grazing business.
One of the conflicts that is often found with farming in ‘wild areas’ is the loss of stock due to predation from birds of prey, mammals and other large predators. In the Balkans there are still bear, wolves and jackals and the loss of sheep to these predators averages about 10 sheep per year. There is a state subsidy available for these losses and there seemed to be little animosity or worry from the grazier about such loss. This conflict in the UK is very pronounced especially when it come to large grouse shooting estates who constantly and systematically remove predators from their lands Again the contrast found in Bulgaria makes a refreshing change to the attitude about predator control in the UK uplands and a lesson can be learned from this.
Figure 4. Cheese making on the Alpine Sheep Grazing Pasture
Towards the end of our time in Bulgaria we had the opportunity to travel to the northern border and visit the Persina Nature Park located on the Danube River which touches on southern Romania. The park is unique for Bulgaria and is the only one on the Bulgarian side of the Danube and covers 21,762 hectares in area. The reserve includes the largest Bulgarian island Belene which is 15 km long and reaches 6 km in width. It was designed to conserve and recover the riparian zones along the Danube and to preserve the natural condition of the multitude of islands within the park (Figure 5).
Figure 5. Persina Nature Park on Danube River
The uniqueness of these islands became the reason to designate almost 7,000 hectares of the Belen Island complex as the largest protected wetland site in Bulgaria. The most important ecosystems in the park are the over flooded forests and the interior swamps. Within the park there are several protected places and reserves, each designed to preserve certain species habitat. The dense forests and the islands' marshlands are extremely important for the reproduction, feeding and rest of great number of waterfowl. During the Soviet Era, the islands were protected by dykes which prevented them from being flooded but in the early 1990’s this flood protection was removed allowing natural process to occur again.
The park's highlight is its birds, with over 170 have been described. The Belene island complex is knows as one of the 50 ornithological places in Bulgaria. Persina Nature Park is home to endangered birds like pygmy cormorant, red-breasted goose. The Sea eagle is the symbol of the park. It is one of the most rarely nesting birds in Bulgaria (Figure 6). This eagle is very sensitive to human presence and there are two reserves within Persina Nature Park, where human activity is strictly prohibited.
The Nature Parks in Bulgaria do not get the same level of protection as National Parks yet the philosophy that guides them leans towards allowing natural process to occur and the benefit of flooding for example in Persina is seen very important. Again this idea of allowing succession to occur is in contrast to that of the UK and again there should be scope to explore these options more and more in the UK especially in the face of climate change and the impact this will have on the landscape.
Figure 6. Cormorants and Pelicans at Persina Nature Park on the Danube River
One interesting point to note is that in 2000 over 3.5 million ft3 of cyanide laced water spilled from a gold mine holding pond into the Danube. These event which has been described as the most significant environmental incident since Chernobyl had and is still having impacts on water quality and wildlife health in the region. A 250 mile stretch of the Danube was devastated from this spill and lessons are still being learned on how to prevent this from happening again.
Conclusion
The main objective of The Nature Exchange programme is to promote a reciprocal transfer and application of sustainable development and best practice, in nature management, between Scotland and other European countries. I would state that for me, this exchange was a great success. Not only did we get exposed to different types of thinking in terms of ecosystem management but we also saw how Bulgaria is ahead of the UK in some ways in protected areas management. I will be giving a presentation about this trip at our next staff meeting and will share some of my thoughts to our team. I am very grateful to the Nature Exchange Programme and Balkan Assist for this opportunity.
Acknowledgements
The partner organisation in Bulgaria was Balkan Assist which is a Sofia based NGO who have worked with ARCH since 2000. Our guide Velislava (Velis) Chilingirova (Figure 7)was an excellent host as she acted as interpreter, answered our questions, helped us order our food and even introduced us to her parents at their house, which provided a real slice of Bulgarian village life. Kudos must go out to Velis who made this trip an inspirational experience. Our transportation was provided by our driver Evo who came along to many of our walks and provided us with a clean and safe bus for our many hours of driving through the Balkans not to mention lots of great music to listen to.
Figure 7. Velis and Evo
Many thanks go to Libby Urquhart from ARCH for making the exchange possible and to the Leonardo da Vinci programme, who provided the funding and framework for the exchange.
Paul Leadbitter – July 16 2008
