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Birds and Habitats Directives: time for better implementation, not reopening

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  • Biodiversity - Flyways

We strongly opposes any attempt to reopen the Birds and Habitats Directives through the proposed stress test of the Nature Directives. The 2016 Fitness Check, conducted by the first Ursula von der Leyen Commission, already confirmed that these laws are fit for purpose. It concluded that the real challenge is not the legal framework itself, but its implementation across the EU. Weakening the Directives now would only create legal uncertainty, delay much needed action, and distract from the urgent delivery of the targets set in EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030. 

The Nature Directives remain the cornerstone of EU biodiversity policy and the legal backbone of nature conservation in Europe. Together with the Water Framework and the Marine Strategy Framework Directives – which are undermined by an ongoing push for simplification – these laws form an overarching and coherent legal framework to protect, manage and conserve European wetlands — including rivers, peatlands, coastal wetlands hosting vibrant yet extremely fragile biodiversity.  

The proposed stress test targets the core site and species protection provisions of these Directives, which provide a carefully balanced and flexible framework that reconciles private and public interests through the precautionary principle and clear legal safeguards. Reopening these core provisions would undermine settled jurisprudence, require new transposition work in Member States, and risk further delays for both nature conservation and the very business interest it aims to promote.  

Recent policy changes in other sectors are already placing additional pressure on the Nature Directives. The rapid expansion of exemptions and shortened timelines introduced in newer legislation promoting the most impactful economic sectors such as energy, mining and transport, already risk eroding the practical effect of the Directives without any formal revision of their text. Instead of creating new carve-outs, the EU should ensure coherence between sectoral policies and nature law, so that energy, infrastructure, agriculture, and other sectoral developments and investments are planned in a way that they avoid sensitive natural areas.  

Benefits of implementing the Directives are greater than the cost

Wetlands International Europe supports cost-effective measures proven to improve implementation without weakening protection. These include stronger monitoring and eased access to species and habitat data through a better integrated data infrastructure, digital case files, GIS-based planning tools, clearer guidance, better coordination between competent authorities, and sufficient staffing and expertise for conservation authorities. While we welcome streamlined permitting when it reduces unnecessary administrative burden, we stress the imperative need to preserve the safeguards of the Nature Directives, and in particular species protection rules. We also recognise and pioneered the use of proactive management in case of widespread species that cause significant damage or represent risk to human health and safety and already recovered to favourable conservation status if these are developed and implemented under the guidance of the competent conservation authorities, which are already permitted under the existing legal framework.  

Protecting wetlands, habitats and species is not a barrier to competitiveness — it is an investment in long-term resilience, legal certainty and sustainable development. The evidence is clear: benefits of implementing the Birds and Habitats Directives, Water Framework Directive and Marine Strategy Framework Directive are greater than the costs. The Natura 2000 network of protected areas established under the Nature Directives, generates ecosystem service benefits estimated at €200-300 billion annually, outweighing by far the estimated annual costs of about €10.2 billion.  

The EU’s competitiveness will be strengthened not by weakening nature law and turning a blind-eye on the biodiversity and climate crises, but by implementing the existing framework better, faster and with appropriate tools, data, guidance and capacity needed to deliver results on the ground. Weakening our nature laws would light the match setting on fire the EU’s capacity to withstand future crises. The EU cannot afford to degrade wetland ecosystems further: now is the time to invest in our future by maintaining high environmental protection standards and keeping Hands Off Nature.  

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