Habitat Directive and Regional Planning: The Special Protection Zones for the Birds Faunae. Methodological proposal for its analysis and assessment

Abstract

The transposition of the EU regulations for the conservation of the biodiversity to the Spanish legislation promoted the delimitation of the so-called Zones of Special Protection of the Avifauna (ZEPAs) and the formulation of special management plans. Even though the Autonomous Communities responded positively to the delimitation of the ZEPAs, the plans remain, in most cases, awaiting to be elaborated. This article points out the methodological contents of a research project aim to analyse and evaluate the territorial and socioeconomics indicators that would intervene in the elaboration of those plans. The research deals with three areas of concerns: territorial analysis, aimed at the selection of sectorial aspects that intervene in the identification of the spaces affected by the conditions of conservation; the economic analysis, centred in the definition of the conservation costs of the protected areas through the application of different methods, and the social analysis, directed to detect the attitudes of the population facing the effects derived from the conservation.