The Protected Landscape Approach - Centre for Mediterranean ...

The Protected Landscape Approach: Linking Nature, Culture and Community
During the harvest season, the juice plant in
Hosttín, Czech Republic, processes about 200 tons
of apples from local orchards. The fruit-processing
operation, which is an important source of
employment in this rural village, is part of an
initiative to encourage planting of traditional fruit
trees. Petr Francán
Land Trust
A farm purchased by the Veronica Foundation in 1998 forms the core of a 10-hectare land trust
in Hosttn that is devoted to reviving and preserving the rich cultural landscape of the region,
including its rich tapestry of fruit orchards, meadows and forests. Fields and forests are
managed according to traditional – in fact ecological – practices, including organic and
extensive agriculture and forestry, and with special care given to cultivating traditional local
varieties of plants and trees.
In 2001 the Veronica Land Trust began a pilot tree-planting project in the area of Jahodisko,
formerly a traditional meadow and orchard pattern, which had been destroyed during the
Communist period. In 2003 this work continued by planting a bio-corridor (a 15m wide belt of
trees) dividing a large field and serving both as soil erosion control, biodiversity and land -
scaping feature.
Working in close cooperation with the Hosttn community, government as well as local
landowners, the Veronica Land Trust has been responsible for the planting of some 700
deciduous saplings and original large trunk varieties of apples, cherries, pears and also wild
trees. This project has helped to renew the natural and cultural values that were lost especially
in the 1970s due to insensitive interventions.
Education – the Training Centre for Rural Sustainability
A long-term aim of partners in the Hosttn project – particularly of the Veronica Ecological
Institute, the Czech Environmental Partnership Foundation (Nadace Partnerství), and the
Twente Energy Institute and Biomass Technology Group (BTG) – is the establishment of a
Centre for Rural Sustainability in the village. The centre will further develop the community
and also provide inspiration and practical education and training for undertaking similar
140