HKBWS WY

News from BirdLife International

07-06-2007

Research confirms extent of Europe’s disappearing farmland birds


Brussels, 7 June 2007: New research has shown that Europe’s farmland birds have declined by almost 50% in the past 25 years – a trend caused by EU-wide agricultural intensification being driven by a policy in need of urgent reform. [1]

The results, released today, bring together the most comprehensive biodiversity indicators of their kind in Europe, collated by the Pan-European Common Bird Monitoring Scheme (PECBMS) - a partnership of leading scientists from the European Bird Census Council, BirdLife International, the RSPB (BirdLife in the UK), and Statistics Netherlands. [2]

The data, collected from 20 national breeding bird surveys spanning Europe over the last 25 years, confirm the extent to which farmland birds have suffered. Across Europe as a whole from 1980 to 2005, common farmland birds have on average fallen in number by 44%–the most severe decline of the bird categories monitored.

http://www.birdlife.org/news/pr/2007/06/europe_bird_declines.html