The vital work the Environment Agency and its partners are doing to help protect England and Wales’ native wildlife, coastal areas and countryside from the effects of development, pollution, flooding, water abstraction, invasive species and climate change was discussed by the Environment Agency Board when it met in Exeter yesterday.

"The Environment Agency has a duty to protect nationally and internationally important wildlife sites and endangered species from the adverse effects of man’s exploitation and intrusion, including climate change," explained Chairman of the Environment Agency Sir John Harman.

"Loss of habitats because of rising sea levels is of particular concern. We have to balance the need for flood defences to protect people and businesses with our need to create new coastal habitats such as saltmarshes, mudflats and wetlands.

"We are also improving and protecting our rivers and streams, lakes and ponds, and coastal seas and estuaries. This challenge involves taking the various diverse national and European laws and through river basin planning turning them into an easier system which everyone - including water and sewage companies, industrial and chemical plants, businesses and tourists, farmers and conservationists, anglers and boaters - understands. They can then play their part in making it happen."

Although the environmental challenges facing the UK are extensive, the Environment Agency has already demonstrated many achievements over the past five years including:

• 1,200 hectares of new wildlife habitat created, and almost 2,000 projects to create or improve wildlife habitat underway;
• £20 million (rising to £70 million with partners) spent on creating new habitat;
• 2,300km of improved river water quality.
• 16% of salmon rivers now have sustainable fish stocks - up from 2%. Salmon and trout are now returning to many rivers in which they were virtually extinct including the Tyne and Wear, the Mersey, the Yorkshire Ouse, the Trent, Taff and the Tees.
• With rivers the cleanest they’ve been since before the Industrial Revolution, otters have returned to every major city in England and increased in numbers in traditional Welsh strongholds.
• Started work on raising water levels to re-wet 11,000 hectares of dried out wetlands.
• Water abstraction limits have been reduced and management plans imposed on many valuable wildlife rivers and protected wetlands - such as the River Darent in Kent, River Derwent in Yorkshire, River Taw in Devon, River Clywedog in Wales, and Redgrave and Lopham Fen in East Anglia.
• Almost £1 billion spent by water companies, regulated by the Environment Agency, between 2000-2010 improving 1,700km of protected rivers and more than 150 nationally important wetland sites.
• 2nd edition of the Water Vole Conservation Handbook providing the latest best-practice for conservation groups, developers and land managers.
• New code for Britain’s most invasive plant species - Japanese Knotweed.
• Successfully breeding endangered Freshwater Pearl Mussels.
• Funded a network of 500 nesting boxes for barn owls, with nearly 1,200 chicks successfully reared.
• Part-funded first national water shrew survey.
• Relocated very rare Vendace fish from lakes in Cumbria to a lake in Scotland where they were extinct due to pollution.

‘’But we can’t be complacent. There are major challenges ahead for our wildlife, especially in the face of climate change and the increasing impact of non-native invasive species," continued Sir John. The key Environment Agency goals over the next five years include:

• Completing work on raising water levels to re-wet 11,000 hectares of dried out wetland habitat in England and Wales by 2010.
• Create at least 1,000 hectares of new wetlands (Already in 2006 we’ve created three new wetlands by breaching manmade tidal defences - augmenting the threat of sea-level rise by re-creating natural coastal protection, including: Alkborough Flats, Lincolnshire; Alnmouth, Northumberland; Wallasea, Essex; Sladesbridge, Cornwall; Rye Harbour Farm, East Sussex).
• Championing the value of maintaining and restoring wetland and coastal habitat to offset the effects of climate change (i.e. increased flooding and storm intensity/proliferation), when new developments are proposed.
• Improving 500km of riverbank habitat.
• Reduction of diffuse pollution, including soil, manure, pesticides and fertilisers washing into rivers, lakes and estuaries from farms, buildings and roads.
• Programme to tackle water abstraction problems in rivers and wetlands.
• Creation of 100 hectares of saltmarsh and mudflat annually to counter losses from sea-level rises.