{"id":1153044,"date":"2023-07-25T14:26:05","date_gmt":"2023-07-25T14:26:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thecanary.co\/?p=1667544"},"modified":"2023-07-25T14:26:05","modified_gmt":"2023-07-25T14:26:05","slug":"englands-wildlife-may-be-much-worse-off-than-we-thought-groundbreaking-analysis-shows","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/2023\/07\/25\/englands-wildlife-may-be-much-worse-off-than-we-thought-groundbreaking-analysis-shows\/","title":{"rendered":"England\u2019s wildlife may be much worse off than we thought, groundbreaking analysis shows"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Groundbreaking new analysis shows that the Conservative government hasn’t assessed almost two-thirds of the land in England’s key wildlife protection sites in over a decade. Moreover, of the sites it has assessed in recent years, a growing proportion are in poor condition.<\/p>\n

The nonprofit Wild Justice, which carried out the analysis, says that the government’s system of nature monitoring has “fallen into disrepair”. It also warns that the findings point to the possibility that England’s wildlife is “in a much worse state than current estimates admit”.<\/p>\n

England’s wildlife assessments are years old<\/h2>\n

Wild Justice published its findings in a report titled A Sight for Sore SSSIs<\/a> <\/em>on 24 July. The title refers to Sites of Special Scientific Interest (SSSIs), which are the focus of the analysis.<\/p>\n

As Natural England<\/a> explains, SSSIs are protected areas aimed at safeguarding a “specific aspect of biological or earth heritage interest”. There are some 7,000 SSSIs across the UK<\/a>, with over half of them situated in England. Natural England is the government body responsible for monitoring these sites in the country.<\/p>\n

Wild Justice submitted Freedom of Information (FOI) requests to the body regarding biological SSSIs. These are sites protected for their important wildlife, rather than their geology or ‘earth heritage’. The organisation sought information on when Natural England last assessed the units that make up these biologically important sites, as well as what the assessments show.<\/p>\n

It found that Natural England has not assessed 66% of SSSIs – by area – in a decade or longer. This means that when the government puts out information on the state of protected nature in England<\/a>, much of it is unlikely to be a true reflection of what’s happening on the ground. Wild Justice’s Mark Avery explained on Twitter:<\/p>\n

Quite frankly, SSSI condition monitoring is way off the pace and gives a falsely optimistic picture of the biological reality. The public is being misled.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Today Wild Justice publishes a report on the state of Sites of Scientific Interest in England after an EIR data request to Natural England https:\/\/t.co\/u6x7R131hJ<\/a><\/p>\n

The report shows that the condition of SSSIs is worse than the most recent NE\/Defra figures (not a surprise), that\u2026 pic.twitter.com\/QB1T9mkEjl<\/a><\/p>\n

— Mark Avery (@MarkAvery) July 25, 2023<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n