Natura 2000

Natura 2000 is the main instrument of the European Union policy for the conservation of biodiversity. It is an ecological network spread throughout the Union, established pursuant to Directive 92/43/CEE “Habitat” to ensure the long-term maintenance of natural habitats and species of flora and fauna that are threatened or rare at community. 

The Natura 2000 network is made up of the Sites of Community Interest (SCI), identified by the Member States in accordance with the Habitats Directive, which are subsequently designated as Special Conservation Areas (SACs), and also includes Special Protection Areas (SPAs) established pursuant to Directive 2009/147/CE “Birds”  concerning the conservation of wild birds. 

The areas that make up the Natura 2000 network are not strictly protected reserves where human activities are excluded; the Habitat Directive intends to guarantee the protection of nature also taking into account “economic, social and cultural needs, as well as regional and local particularities” (Art. 2). Private entities can own Natura 2000 sites, ensuring their sustainable management from both an ecological and an economic point of view.

The Directive recognizes the value of all those areas in which the centuries-old presence of man and his traditional activities has allowed the maintenance of a balance between human activities and nature. Agricultural areas, for example, are linked to numerous animal and plant species that are now rare and threatened for whose survival it is necessary to continue and enhance traditional activities, such as grazing or non-intensive agriculture. The same title of the Directive specifies the objective of conserving not only natural habitats but also semi-natural ones (such as traditional agriculture areas, woods used, pastures, etc.).

Another innovative element is the recognition of the importance of some landscape elements that play a connecting role for wild flora and fauna (art. 10). Member States are invited to maintain or if necessary develop these elements to improve the ecological coherence of the Natura 2000 network.

In Italy,  SIC, le ZSC e le ZPS cover a total of about 19% of the national terrestrial territory and more than 13% of the marine one.

SUSCEPTIBILITY TO ALIEN SPECIES INVASIONS

Select the input values and start the execution with the “Run the workflow” button.

 

      


 

Ecosystem vulnerability to invasive and alien species – showcase

Experimental design and results

Data were collected at site level for several taxonomic group in different ecodomains (freshwater, lagoons, terrestrial and marine environments). When necessary, data were enriched with abiotic variables (i.e. local average temperature, average precipitation amount, chlorophyll, etc.) to perform further analyses.

In order to evaluate which variables best predict the occurrence of Alien Species in a site, the dataset, aggregated by taxonomic group (the level of aggregation was not the same for the different analyses), was analysed using a GLMM (Generalized Linear Mixed Model). Mixed models are powerful and flexible and well suited for the data collected in the case study (for details of statistical analysis see the paper published).

Currently, the workflow expects as input a dataset already available in the LifeWatch Italy Dataportal. The workflow will do some operations on the input dataset in order to perform the statistical analyses described above. As output the workflow will return tables and graphs associated to the GLMM output.

Showcase Team

 

Freshwaters Database manager
Angela Boggero 

Marine Database manager
Cataldo Pierri 

Transitional Waters Database manager
& Metadata manager
Ilaria Rosati

IT specialist
Nicola Fiore 

Experimental design and statistical analysis
Paolo Colangelo 

Architecture and development of Alien Species VRE components
Paolo Tagliolato 
Paolo Colangelo
Alessandro Oggioni

Data providers
List

Publications AS

  • Boggero, A., Pierri, C., Alber, R. et al. (2016). A geographic distribution data set of biodiversity in Italian freshwaters. Biogeographia – The Journal of Integrative Biogeography 31: 55–72. DOI:10.21426/B631132737
  • Corriero, G., Pierri, C., Accoroni, S. et al. (2016). Ecosystem vulnerability to alien and invasive species: A case study on marine habitats along the Italian coast. Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems, 26, 392-409. DOI: 10.1002/aqc.2550
  • Boggero, A., Basset, A., Austoni, M. et al. (2014). Weak effects of habitat type on susceptibility to invasive freshwater species: an Italian case study. Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems, 24, 841-852. DOI: 10.1002/aqc.2450

Coordination Team

Giuseppe Corriero

LifeWatch Italy,

Università di Bari

giuseppe.corriero[at]uniba.it

Angela Boggero

LifeWatch Italy,

CNR

angela.boggero[at]cnr.it

Paolo Colangelo

LifeWatch Italy,

CNR

paolo.colangelo[at]uniroma1.it

Cataldo Pierri

LifeWatch Italy,

CNR

cataldo.pierri[at]uniba.it

Paolo Tagliolato

LifeWatch Italy,

CNR

tagliolato.p[at]irea.cnr.it

Nicola Fiore

LifeWatch ERIC,

Service Centre

nicola.fiore[at]lifewatch.eu

Ilaria Rosati

CNR,

Institute of Ecosystem Study

ilaria.rosati[at]cnr.it

Alberto Basset

LifeWatch Italy,

University of Salento

alberto.basset[at]unisalento.it

Lucia Vaira

LifeWatch ERIC,

Service Centre

lucia.vaira[at]lifewatch.eu

Maria Teresa Manca

LifeWatch ERIC,

Service Centre

mteresa.manca[at]lifewatch.eu

Alessandro Oggioni

CNR Electromagnetic Sensing of the Environment (IREA), Remote Sensing Department

oggioni.a[at]irea.cnr.it

Alien Species VRE

This type of study requires the assemblage of a vast data set from multiple biological communities. To address this research the Alien Species VRE provides access to data resources and species lists, which are the backbone to address intrinsic habitat/ecosystem vulnerability to biological invasions, and which are generally unorganized and unavailable as on-line services. The Alien Species VRE was conceived and built as easily accessible to stakeholders to overcome these obstacles.

The Alien Species VRE allows the study of the presence and distribution of Alien Species, and their relationships with native species through a macroecological approach. It considers different taxonomic groups, ecosystem functions and properties, patterns and vectors of Alien Species introduction, and impacts influencing their presence and distribution at local/global level.

Within the Alien Species VRE users have access to environmental and climatic data, and numerous other layers of information for the study of Alien Species distribution. Stakeholder can reproduce the same type of research using their own data, but only after uploading them into the system and after passing the quality control for biological data offered by the LifeWatch Italy Data Portal.

The structure of the Alien Species VRE gives access to biodiversity data, to the Alien Species Thesaurus for the definition of alien species, to additional metadata, workflows, tools for statistical analysis, and on line services.

The list of capabilities offered is as follow: data interoperability, quality assurance, definition of process and metadata for the domains of interest, niche modelling techniques and tools, biological distribution maps, environmental suitability maps.