Posted by Zoltan Kun, Executive Director, PAN Parks Foundation
After the long winter, spring has finally arrived in most parts of Europe and you see that people are approaching to go out. It looks as – at least deep in our heart – all of us are outdoor addicts!
See the people on this picture above – I bet many of them are tourists – sitting along the river Spee in Berlin downtown area, not far from Reichstag. They need an environment which is full of natural features, lawn and water at least to increase the joy of being out.
I am a landscape architect myself, who learned how to design public and private green spaces. But I have actually never designed one single garden or park. I always worked in nature conservation because the ultimate outdoor experience is in not built nature. I fall in love with wilderness and luckily I can work for it!
Posted by Vlado Vancura (Conservation Manager, PAN Parks Foundation)
World Health Day is celebrated on 7th April to mark the anniversary of the founding of World Health Organization in 1948. Each year a theme is selected for World Health Day to highlight a priority area of public health concern in the world. The theme for 2013 is high blood pressure.
High blood pressure – also known as raised blood pressure or hypertension – increases the risk of heart attacks, strokes and kidney failure. If left uncontrolled, high blood pressure can also cause blindness, irregularities of the heartbeat and heart failure. The risk of developing these complications is higher in the presence of other cardiovascular risk factors such as diabetes. One in three adults worldwide has high blood pressure.
Posted by Zoltan Kun, Executive Director, PAN Parks Foundation
Earth Hour is a very effective awareness raising tool to call the attention of the large public to the climate change. Led by WWF, one of PAN Parks’ founding partners, this event became a major public conservation happening in the past years across the globe.
Our team at PAN Parks was wondering how the Earth Hour can actually benefit Europe’s wilderness. First of all we should look at Europe’s satellite image and we can easily recognise that the attempt to call people switching off their lights would not have an effect in wilderness areas. Large scale wilderness places, like Certified PAN Parks, are the few locations where we – Europeans - can still enjoy real dark sky! The light pollution is minimal!
The human world is using the equivalent of one and a half planets to support its life on Earth. Our direct footprint on species, habitats and landscapes is far too high in most places. For example, remaining old-growth forests and large wilderness areas are rare, especially in Old Europe. Our indirect footprint through energy and raw material consumption exceed our true needs, as we are wasting energy and food in some countries... while lacking in others.
WWF's Earth Hour campaign was born out of a hope that this could change. At 8.30pm on 23th March hundreds of millions of people will turn off their lights for one hour, on the same night, all across the world in a huge, symbolic show of support. They will be turning off lights to turn in new ideas by connecting people, and connecting people to nature.
Since 2007 the world’s biggest campaign on awareness raising to take action against climate change grew from one city in Australia to approx. 7,000 cities in 152 countries. Hundreds of millions of people switched of their lights for one hour and celebrated with WWF and partners.
But the Earth Hour is more than just switching of the lights, it is more than darkening the most attractive buildings all over the world, it is more than just saving the energy for one single hour.
Photo: PAN Parks presentation was voted the best at ITB
Posted by Zoltan Kun, Executive Director, PAN Parks Foundation
PAN Parks Foundation attended the last ITB, the largest global travel show in Berlin on March 2013. Here come some observations based on what was said, distributed and experienced during the event.
Ecotourism is still far to be considered as a mainstream activity within the tourism sector. This might not be a problem, but unfortunately ecotourism related exhibitors were really pushed into a remote corner of the event. At the same time according to the UNWTO research, more than 15% of tourists in Europe - which means more than 75 million people, is looking for responsible tourism products.
Technology got a great highlight during the ITB. There is increasing intention to use Internet technology for increasing visitor satisfaction and make reservations easier.
We have a very special blog post today, on 8th March, the International Women’s Day. We would like to enhance the role of women in wilderness protection in Europe, so we asked our female colleagues, friends and partners in our network, to describe what role wilderness has in their lives. Let’s see, what wilderness means to women?
"Wilderness is the place, what pulls me out from the everyday routine. No wellness hotel can fill me with so much energy like spending a day in wilderness. I love forests especially, where I can empty my brain, I can concentrate only on myself and enjoy the miracle of trees, the singing of birds and sounds of the wilderness." Eszter Balogh, PAN Parks Foundation
Posted by Vlado Vancura (Conservation Manager, PAN Parks Foundation)
Several arguments are dealing with large predators from time to time. Why are they considered critically important in maintaining the integrity of ecosystems and so are critically important for wilderness? First of all, ecological interactions are initiated by top predators. Secondly, wide-ranging predators usually require large cores of protected landscapes for foraging and seasonal movements. Thirdly, connectivity is required, because core reserves are typically not large enough to maintain sustainable viable predators’ populations.
If we kill off wolves and other wild hunters, we’ll lose not only the prominent species, but also the key to ecological and evolutionary process of top-down regulation. Large carnivores are essential for landscape-level ecological restoration as well, as for the restoration of other highly interactive species and the dynamism of natural processes, such as fire and flood. These are all critically important elements of wilderness.
Posted by Jo Roberts, Chief Executive of the Wilderness Foundation UK
Working outdoors with people is not only good for the soul, but increasingly it is being recognised as a benefit that improves social and personal wellbeing. As a result it addresses on-going costs to social and health care and ultimately can save money.
Why? Because evidence of this as an effective therapeutic environment, with long lasting effects, is growing across Europe.Working with other organisations we are exploring ways of demonstrating how the protection of heritage wilderness areas in Europe can have a ripple effect in social capital for governments and local communities. We are tying together how we will benefit people. It is a critical approach in this era of financial austerity where the environment takes the last seat on the bus of employment and economic concerns.
Posted by Zoltan Kun, Executive Director of PAN Parks Foundation
Introduction PAN Parks Foundation (PPF), the European wilderness protection organisation, founded a decade ago has grown into an internationally respected organisation. From day one, promoting research projects on wilderness has been an integral component to PPF´s success as wilderness was a novel concept in Europe in the 1990ies. Models using tourism as a tool for con servation and regional development - for instance EUROPARC’s European Charter of Sustainable Tourism in Protected Areas – did not purely focus on wilderness. Thus, PPF cooperated with research institutes to integrate wilderness theory and practice into its principles and criteria.
Posted on April 25, 2013 at 01:04 pm | Leave a comment »