After joining the EU in 2004, Slovenia was obliged to designate special protection areas and to incorporate them into the European network Natura 2000. In order to maintain the status of protected areas, Natura 2000 sites were integrated into the existing forest management plans which thus gained the status of plans necessary for preservation and creation of favorable circumstances for qualifying species and habitat types in the Natura 2000 areas. To achieve success in the protection of Natura 2000 sites, stakeholdersmust be involved in the process of creating management plans for forest management units, as this is the only way to ensure the conservation objectives are kept realistic and later on implemented.
|