Nature areas and nature policy do not stop at the national borders. Due to its production and consumption, the Netherlands also contributes to the worldwide decline in biodiversity. A large part of our wood and food is produced elsewhere in the world, and space is required for this production. The total amount of land that is currently needed for the consumption of everyone in the Netherlands is approximately three times the total land area of the country.

This is a worldwide trend: worldwide consumption is increasing; as a result, the pressure on biodiversity is not decreasing. In Dutch society, a debate is currently taking place about whether the expansion of the area of protected area in the Netherlands can take place at the expense of productive agricultural land in the Netherlands. This involves a political trade-off between the societal functions of nature conservation and agricultural production. Due to the many claims on space, it appears unlikely that the target for the
Netherlands
and
Europe, i.e. to prevent further loss of biodiversity by 2010 and thereafter, will be achieved. Achieving the aim of slowing the world-wide loss of biodiversity by 2010 also appears to be unlikely.

 

Compared with other countries, the Netherlands has lost much of the original terrestrial biodiversity. The future development (shown with the dotted lines) is according to the trend scenario of the OESO without additional policy. In the future, it appears that the natural biodiversity in the Netherlands will decline more slowly (source: OESO, 2008; Alkemade et al., 2006; Rienks, 2008; RIVM, 2002a).

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