Dare2Connect

Dare2Connect

Countries

Austria, Czech Republic, Serbia, Romania, Slovakia, Hungary

Name of client, beneficiary

Ministry of Finance (hosting the Managing Authority/Joint Secretariat of Danube Transnational Programme,

Origin of funding

ERDF - Fund, European Commission, Directorate General for Regional Policy

Names of consortium members

LP ERDF: BUND Project Office Green Belt, Nuremberg ;DE

Project start

2018-06-01

Project end

2021-11-30

Short description

The European Green Belt initiative developed an extraordinary ecological network and living memorial landscape along the former Iron Curtain. On a length of 12.500 km it connects 24 European countries and contains almost all types of ecosystems that can be found in Europe.

However, the Green Belt still suffers from a certain level of not sufficiently connected habitats and valuable landscapes. The main objective of the „DaRe to Connect (D2C)“ project is therefore the implementation of the EU Danube Strategy.

Experts of the Umweltbundesamt (Environment Agency Austria) define feasible ecological corridors between Natura 2000 areas on transnational as well as macro-regional levels. Thereby, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and remote sensing approaches, partly based on newly available EU-Copernicus (Sentinel) data, are used.

Services provided:

• Enhancing ecological connectivity and Eco-System Services (ESS) provision by detailed ecological and spatial analyses.
• Promoting the establishment of ecological corridors between Natura 2000 sites and other sites of ecological importance.
• Bringing together public and private actors along the Green Belt in order to preserve ecological corridors and their natural values and services.

Topics

Biodiversity Conservation

Project links

https://www.umweltbundesamt.at/dare-to-connect