Construction is the greatest threat to biodiversity – EU survey
James Debono
The Maltese are the likeliest in Europe to consider creeping urbanization and construction as the major threat to bio-diversity, a Eurobarometer survey shows.
In Malta and the UK, 16% of respondents believed that changes in land use and the creation of more roads, houses or industrial sites constituted the biggest threats to biodiversity. The EU-wide survey showed that respondents in these two countries were the most likely to think that urbanization
On the other hand, only 8% of the Maltese considered climate change as the major threat to biodiversity – compared to 22% of Danes and 20% of Finns.
The results of the survey come in the wake of growing concern by naturalists on the status of a number of Maltese reptiles and mammals.
Naturalists Jeffrey and Arnold Sciberras have disputed claims in MEPA’s state of the environment report that an endemic lizard species – the Selmunett lizard – is still in existence, although in this case the cause of the alleged extinction is not urbanisation, but the introduction of an alien species (rats) in its environment.
But John Borg, curator of the National History Museum, told MaltaToday that a decline of sightings of the Maltese weasel could be attributed to the loss of natural habitat through urbanisation, while four of Malta’s six resident bat species are likewise threatened by excessive construction.
Of the rest of Europe, Czech respondents were the most capable of defining what biodiversity loss meant: only 8% of Czechs were unable to give an answer. Respondents in Ireland, on the other hand, most often gave a “don’t know” answer (43%) followed by respondents in Denmark (35%). Malta weighs in 33%.
But while a respectable 53% of the Maltese respondents had heard the term biodiversity, only 18% knew what it really meant.
To compare with the most similar EU member state, the Maltese were almost twice as likely as Cypriots to have heard the term biodiversity (53% in Malta against 27% in Cyprus), but the percentage of respondents who knew what biodiversity actually meant was only 5% higher in Malta (18% in Malta and 13% in Cyprus).
Meanwhile, the percentage of Maltese who were aware of the EU’s Natura 2000 network has increased sharply from just 16% in 2007 to 29% in 2009 – a staggering increase of 13%, which may be attributable to recent political contoversies such as the proposed developments in Mistra valley and Bahrija respectively.
Although 71% are still unaware of the Natura 2000 network, the Maltese in this regard remain more knowledgeable than the British: 97% of whom have never heard of this network of EU protected sites. jdebono@mediatoday.com.mt
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