Private Landowners, what role for Europe's nature?

The European Landowners’ Organization (ELO) and the European Private Land Conservation Network (LIFE ELCN) are organising a meeting hosted by MEP Karl-Heinz Florenz at the European Parliament on 5 February 2019 themed ‘Private Landowners, what role for Europe’s nature?’

The conservation and management of privately-owned land has great potential to contribute to and complement ongoing efforts to achieve the EU goals for nature conservation as well as to provide support to private landowners. Agreements such as safe harbour agreements, covenants, conservation easements, tax and fiscal benefits, and land swaps, for example, represent an important complement to public sector investments in conservation resulting from direct appropriations or public regulatory approaches.
With the support of the European Commission, initiatives have begun to identify how private land owners can play a more robust, complementary role in the national and EU level efforts in protected area management. In so doing, these efforts can contribute to national EU and global protected area targets.