Identifying Key Black Sea Coastal Habitats: Coastal Habitat Red Book for Georgia

The Black Sea Regional Activity Centre for Conservation of the Biological Diversity in Batumi, Georgia with assistance from the EuropeAid Black Sea Environmental Programme project (implemented by ARCADIS Euroconsult) is working on the development of a common methodology for the preparation of a Black Sea Habitats Red Data Book. Georgia is the pilot for the rest of the Black Sea range states, so that problems can be identified and a methodology can be described.

The ultimate goal of the Habitat Red Book is to be able to better protect important habitats and species, by exactly knowing their location and condition and at the same time having a baseline to monitor them. In this way conservation efforts can be more focussed.

The wider objective of the present work is to fulfil part of a requirement of The Black Sea Biodiversity and Landscape Conservation Protocol, that was signed in June 2002 by the Environmental Ministers of Black Sea countries, in Sofia, Bulgaria.