Parco Nazionale del Vesuvio

What's New

Start of the Interreg IIIC Project 'Network of the Parks'

• Program (PDF format, Italian text)
• Leaflet (PDF format, Italian text)
• Entry form (DOC format, Italian text)

Further information (Italian text)

Interreg IIIC "Network of the Parks"

• exchange of experience and good practices between the Member States and with third countries concerning cross-border and transnational cooperation of the sections A and B of INTERREG III
• cooperation activities in the fields of research, technological development, enterprise, information societies, tourism, culture, and environment.

The participation of insular and ultra-suburban regions together with that of the Member Countries at the networks of operators is very important. In addition, the bilateral cooperation will be encouraged between maritime regions.

Interreg IIIC and the European and Mediterranean Parks

The INTERREG IIIC Project “Network of the Parks" aims to create a large aggregation net among the various European Parks in order to unite the already existing management experiences, the initiatives carried out, the technical, administrative, and financial innovations forming the humus of projects and perspectives which everyone can support.
The creation of an international net of experiences, personnel, and studies exchanges, and of a technologically advanced database, based on the web and on the projects which have been already realized deserves the attention of the Italian and European partners of Interreg III.
The project "Network of the Parks" is based on the adhesion of the Natural Parks, Resarch Entities, and Central Administrations responsible for the management of protected areas and it is framed in the general issue of the collaboration and the coordination among the States gravitating in the Mediterranean Region and the States of Northern, Oriental, and Atlantic Europe.

Interreg IIIC and the "Network of the Parks" Project

The European continent can be read as a "unitary environment". As a matter of fact, all the States are united by the same settlement concentration processes in some areas and by depopulation processes in others.
The marginal territories subject to depopulation have preserved the integrity of their resources and values, but they have also suffered a strong deceleration in the social, cultural, and economic growth; on the contrary, in the territories characterized by conditions of overexploitation of the resources, which are witnessed by the great level of growth of human settlements, we have often seen the loss of the cultural identity and an economic stagnation.
Such a complex picture creates a generalized problem in the relationship between the environmental preservation and the development polices which must melt in a “anthropized-conservative” management of the territories.
The demand for the creation of environmental networks dealing with the double aspects of Europe derives from here:

• the areas included in the Mediterranean basin are so deeply influenced by the human activity that we can speak of a complex "co-evolution" between human civilizations and natural environments.
  Problems of insularization, difficulties to locate great connection spaces, of coexistence between human activities and natural dynamics join the Mediterranean environments which probably need more than others a really "sustainable" management. As a matter of fact, the greatest part of the Mediterranean protected areas show features which make them very similar for conditions and problems to real geographical islands; we cannot suppose in them wide ecological corridors, as in other regions, but it must be above all considered the rural and suburban space allowing the limitation of the settlement pressure;
  
• the areas of Northern and Oriental Europe, although suffering only partially the consequences of anthropization, especially in the modern era, have put man's activities in a central position in the process of environmental safeguard and exploitation. In the whole European continent, the government units of the protected territories pay great attention to the economic and social development, aware of the importance of a concrete relationship man-nature-landscape.

The ecological restructuring action of the European territory must consider the two area typologies and proceed startig from the most decentralized government levels such as the natural protected areas.
The protected natural areas represent indeed true experimental laboratories in which the plans are created according to the most innovative techniques and methodologies, and the intervention is carried out after evaluating the impact of the action on the enviroment and on the local population.
The number of experiences in the environmental field carried out in Europe are not organic and sistematic and the policies of territorial management are still extremely diversified and various.
The Authorities managing the protected areas are therefore the holders of a heritage of information and experiences, and they are stimulated by the continuous exchanges aimed to the improvement of their actions on the involved territories.
The Network of the Parks is an attempt to plan the territory management policies according to common themes and wide perspectives: on the one side, the Mediterranean protected areas, which need to exploit the actions deriving from the "Network" of resources, competences, and managerial experiences; on the other side, the protected areas of the North-East-West Zones of the P.I.C. Interreg IIIC, which may have an "antithetical" role for their naturalistic features, and therefore can become a constant incentive to the study of deeply different natural and cultural heritage.

Specific aspects justifying the cooperation

The project carries out the main targets established by the European Commission:

• the growth of the cooperation in the field of the preservation and management of the natural and environmental heritage, in order to guarantee an economic development and a greater and better social cohesion
• the individualisation of the best approaches to the territorial planning and management
• the competitiveness of the regions involved in the project, so that they will be able to take advantage of more effective, more modern, and more dynamic territorial strategies
• the realization of a sustainable development through compatible and rational political and cultural choices.

This project also reaches transversally the target of the development of new occupational policies, made possible by a greater competitiveness of the geographical areas and by the definition of strategies oriented towards the most modern and innovative professions.

Main targets

The establishment of an international network between the European protected areas and the Mediterranean basin, developed through a database with an advanced technological web-based platform, aims at:

• gathering and monitoring in a structured way the experiences and the experiments of managerial models used in the protected areas, linked to local contexts and exportable within the Network member countries
• make transparent the initiatives and the different models of approach through the establishment of a steady network open to all the Mediterranean countries involved, fostering a confrontation on the possible directions to take for the safeguard and the management of the territory through the benchmarking and the comparison of different experiences
• fostering innovative actions, communication and advanced information services, assistance and advice, spaces for specialistic debates about the planning of interventions and the best-practises concerning the safeguard and management of protected areas of continental Europe and the Mediterranean.

Attended results

On the one hand, the Network will make possible the repetition of maintenance, planning and management actions of the environmental and natural heritage all over the regional territory, and on the other hand it will promote new initiatives supporting the different governmental levels in the realization of the aim of lasting development.

The impelling demand for environmental preservation has led again to studies and debates which confirm the tendency towards non-sectorial interventions inspired to a substantial redefinition of the projects and the programmes.
The National Parks play an essential role for the spirit animating them in the floral and faunal safeguard as well as in the rational and correct use of natural resources.
Although we have witnessed a number of important initiatives which have been undertaken by all European and Mediterranean National Parks, we have also registered a great lack of administrative and technical offices, where the management experiences of the protected areas should be gathered in a rational and organic manner.
The Interreg IIIC "Network of the Parks" Project promoted and organized by the Parco Nazionale del Vesuvio aims to safeguard the environment through a unitary and coherent management, in which scientific, social, political, and cultural aspects come together in an active and productive manner, according to what established by the INTERREGIIIC Community Programme.
Therefore, the Network of the Parks is an attempt to plan the territory management policies according to common themes and wide perspectives: on the one side, the Mediterranean protected areas, which need to exploit the actions deriving from the "Network" of resources, competences, and managerial experiences; on the other side, the protected areas of the North-East-West Zones of the P.I.C. Interreg IIIC, which may have an "complementary" role for their naturalistic features.
The Project has already been presented at the Forum Transnational "Interreg III C - Zone Sud", on 4th-5th July 2002 in Palma di Maiorca. Here, thanks to the financial support of the Parco Nazionale del Vesuvio, the first International Atelier held in the Osservatorio Vulcanologico Vesuviano in Ercolano on 8th October 2002 was presented; finally, during the "Interreg InfoDays" held in Valencia on 10th-11th October 2002 there was a useful and interesting debate between the representatives of the Mediterranean and of the European Continental Areas.
In the official web pages at www.retedeiparchi.com you will find documentation and news about the INTERREG Community Programme and about the "Network of the Parks" Project.

Ente Parco Nazionale del Vesuvio
P.zza Municipio,8 - 80040 San Sebastiano al Vesuvio (NA)
Tel. +39.081/7710911 - Fax +39.081/7718215
Web : www.retedeiparchi.com
e-mail : info@retedeiparchi.com

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