Council Hosts Seminar Aiming to Protect and Enhance North Devon's Natural Environment 3 February 2012

North Devon Council hosted an environment seminar on Friday. 

The seminar was organised to discuss what can be done to protect and enhance North Devon's natural environment.

Representatives from Natural England, Defra, North Devon AONB and Biosphere Service (NDABS), Exmoor National Park, Devon Wildlife Trust and the Environment Agency, as well as local landowners, businesses and health agencies attended.

The event addressed how the environment affects our lives in North Devon, focusing on 4 themes:

• the green economy
• leisure tourism and well-being
• protecting the North Devon landscape and natures
• towards a carbon neutral North Devon.

Delegates worked in small groups to formulate suggestions for how to deal with the environmental challenges we face in North Devon.

Some ideas included:

• better awareness of some of the things North Devon already does to help protect and celebrate the environment
• a way to measure the value of the environment in the same way we measure more tangible things, such as visitor numbers and visitor spend
• a proactive lead by the local authority on main streaming environmental outputs, not just tourism but all businesses, the public sector and communities.

Executive Member for Environment. Councillor Rodney Cann said: 'Protecting and enhancing the natural environment is one of the council's top priorities.

'The environment makes a significant contribution to the health and wellbeing of the local community and plays an important role in supporting sustainable tourism and the economy.

'The seminar is a positive step towards developing an environmental policy with our partners, to give some clear direction for managing and protecting the environment, both now and in the future.'

On of the seminar's speakers, Manda Brookman from Cornwall Action for Sustainable Tourism (CoaST) said: 'Events like this help highlight the good stuff that's going on in North Devon.

'Everyone has a responsibility for the environment and if you excite people about their surroundings, you'll inspire them to also have that interest.

'So we all need to make a collective effort towards a sustainable environment and what fantastic raw materials we have to work with.'

The seminar followed the successful economy and housing seminar held last September.

The earlier seminar has developed a partnership group to work through some of the key issues.

The council hopes to form a similar partnership group focusing on the environment.