Nature Conservation Legislation

Nature Conservation 1/2009 — 20. 2. 2009 — Nature Conservation Legislation — Print article in pdf

Possibilities of Contracted Nature Conservation and Landscape Protection

autorka: Pavlína Komínková

Legal regulation in nature conservation and landscape protection in the Czech Republic can be characterized by using particularly administrative tools, from the State Nature Conservancy authorities’ binding positions to the prohibitions on some activities, to them statutory exceptions can be enacted. The main piece of legislation, setting-up rights and duties in nature conservation and landscape protection, is Act No. 114/1992 Gazette on the Protection of Nature and the Landscape, as amended later. The above act includes a special provision, under which naturally valuable sites/areas or even trees can be conserved by a contract. The efforts for using the contracted nature conservation is related particularly to the Sites of European Importance (in the above act the term for Sites of Community Importance, SCIs under the Habitats Directive), which are parts of the European Community’s Natura 2000 network. In the case of the Sites of European Importance, the act allows that conservation can be implemented by a contract instead of otherwise obligatory establishing a Specially Protected Area. Thus, land- or property owners can agree the conservation conditions instead of accepting the conditions given for the particular Specially Protected Area category directly by the Act. Nevertheless, the contracts have raised some legal complications, obstacles and troubles.