Europes ecological backbone.pdf

Land cover and uses
Figure 7.7 Average contribution of each
land‐cover flow to the total
amount of change in the periods
1990–2000 and 2000–2006 in
European mountain massifs
Urban land management
Urban residential sprawl
Sprawl of economic sites and
infrastructure
Agricultural internal conversions
Conversion from forested and
natural land to agriculture
Withdrawal of farming
Forests creation and
management
Water bodies creation and
management
Changes of land cover due to
natural and multiple causes
%
0 20 40 60 80
1990–2000 2000–2006
In Table 7.6, the countries with the highest percentage
of land‐cover changes in mountain areas (ranging
from 0.3 % to 1.3 %) for the two time periods have
been highlighted in grey and are discussed in
Section 7.3.1. Detailed analysis of the changes in
mountains at country level, differentiating between
Member States of the former EU‐15 and new Member
States of the EU‐27, is presented in Figures 7.8 and 7.9.
'Forest creation and management' and 'agricultural
internal conversion' were the two main changes
in the EU‐15 and the new EU‐27 Member States in
both periods. Rates of the former were similar for
both sets of Member States in both periods, but
higher in the EU‐15 in 1990–2000 and for the new
Member States in 2000–2006. However, reflecting the
differing social, economic and political trends, the
changes in 'agricultural internal conversion' were
considerably larger in the new Member States —
especially in 1990–2000.
7.3.1 Assessment of potential drivers of land‐cover
changes at country level
The drivers of land-use change vary considerably
at all spatial scales. Box 7.3 discusses these drivers
Table 7.6 Annual changes in land cover (%)
in the mountains of each country:
1990–2000 and 2000–2006
Country
Annual
change
1990–2000
Annual
change
2000–2006
Albania – 0.12
Austria 0.03 0.09
Belgium 0.43 0.37
Bosnia and Herzegovina – 0.12
Bulgaria 0.09 0.07
Croatia 0.07 0.17
Cyprus – 0.58
Czech Republic 1.29 0.44
Finland – 0.03
France 0.13 0.08
Germany 0.19 0.07
Greece 0.19 –
Hungary 0.59 0.33
Iceland – 0.06
Ireland 0.69 0.65
Italy 0.14 0.07
Luxembourg 0.04 0.07
Former Yugoslav
Republic of Macedonia – 0.14
Malta 0.09 0.00
Montenegro – 0.04
Norway – 0.09
Poland 0.10 0.08
Portugal 0.86 1.84
Romania 0.20 0.09
Serbia – 0.05
Slovakia 0.64 0.32
Slovenia 0.02 0.02
Spain 0.30 0.25
Sweden – 0.27
Turkey – 0.06
United Kingdom 0.27 –
Note:
Countries with the highest percentage of land-cover
change are maked in grey.
Source: Based on EEA datasets (CLC1990–2000–2006).
www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/data/corine-landcover-1990-2000
and
www.eea.europa.eu/data-and-maps/data/corine-landcover-2000-2006.
for the Alps, and Box 7.4 presents the specific
example of the mountains of Iceland. To assess the
potential drivers of land‐cover changes at country
level, the six countries with the highest proportions
of land‐cover changes for the two time periods
(Table 7.6) were selected. These countries are in
124 Europe's ecological backbone: recognising the true value of our mountains