Wanna Argument?

Reserved for the future

Habitat destruction is one of the key issues of the day. From deforestation in the Amazon, to the loss of the smallest pond, the pressures of development have led to the marginalisation of biodiversity and pressure on wildlife habitats. In coastal areas wetlands have suffered; inland, brownfield sites have scarred the landscape and driven out wildlife. But just as rising sea levels can present opportunities to recreate lost coastal habitat, so too can former industrial sites be harnessed for the benefit of wildlife and local communities.

From mineral to animal and vegetable

The extraction of useful materials from beneath the ground, offers a number of benefits, some perhaps less expected than others:

• Rock, aggregates and other minerals are taken from quarries to help make products that are often taken from granted. Paper and glass manufacturing relies on these materials. We also use quarried minerals in cosmetics and toothpastes.
• It is reported that every year we use almost four tonnes of aggregates per person in the UK. In 2006, demand for aggregate was predicted to be 247 million tonnes. The majority of this comes from primary sources. But after extraction, all quarries must be restored.
• This means that when a quarry's aggregate resources are exhausted there is a chance to do something special with the site.
• Government guidance offers three end-uses for mineral extraction sites: agriculture, forestry and amenity. Of these, agriculture is the common; forestry is rarely adopted as an end-use; amenity could be used more frequently.

Extracting minerals? You'll have to think of an end-use too. Copyright: Alice Davies, RSPB

Amenity includes water-based sports, fishing lakes, golf courses and many other forms of recreation. Nature conservation also falls under this heading and it is this area that some key organisations such as the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds (RSPB) believe offers scope for some ambitious projects. The RSPB believes that whilst nature conservation can include the smallest wildlife pond, patch of woodland or hedgerow, we should be creating large-scale semi-natural habitats for the benefit of the environment, the economy and for the health and well-being of all people.

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