Environmental Protection and Mountains Is Environmental Law Adapted to the Challenges Faced by Mountain Areas?

ALPINE CONVENTION www.alpconv.org Permanent Secretariat of the Alpine Convention Environmental Protection and Mountains Is Environmental Law Adapted to the Challenges Faced by Mountain Areas? Edited by Patricia Quillacq and Marco Onida Environmental Protection and Mountains Is Environmental Law Adapted to the Challenges Faced by Mountain Areas? Lessons from European Ranges Permanent Secretariat of the Alpine Convention Edited by Patricia Quillacq and Marco Onida 3 Contents p. 4 Introduction p. 7 List of abbreviations p. 9 I - A Long Way Coming to Mountain Protection Law and Mountain Treaties p. 10 Breaking the Whiteness in the Alpine Landscape: An Heritage of the Nation-State Building Process (19th century) - Cristina Joanaz de Melo p. 22 Role and Place of Mountainous Areas in the Development of Nature Conservation Legislation - Ludwig Krämer p. 35 II - National and International Legal and Policy Frames p. 36 Water in the Mountains: Aspects of Legal Protection - Karl Weber p. 44 The Swiss Approach to Mountain Protection and its Relation to European Law: Complementarities or Conflict? -Astrid Epiney/Jennifer Heuck p. 60 GMOs in the Alps: To Impose, To Dismiss or To Mould? - Gerd Winter p. 72 Land Use and its Changes - Borut Šantej p. 78 Tourism for Mountain Sustainable Development: A Comparative Law Perspective - Elisa Morgera IMPRINT Editors: p. 93 III - The Range Approach: Surveying the Experiences and Patricia Quillacq and Marco Onida Identifying the Potential for New Mountain Treaties Cover photo: p. 94 A Common Approach to Mountain Specific Challenges: Franco Monari The Alpine Convention - Marco Onida Graphics: p. 112 The Carpathian Convention: Specificity of the Methods to Respond to De Poli & Cometto - Belluno - Italy Mountain Challenges - Pier Carlo Sandei Printing: p. 118 Alps and Balkans: Potentials for Cooperation and Nero su Bianco - Belluno - Italy Common Approach - Tanja Bogataj p. 128 The Pyrenees: Missing a Convention? Permanent Secretariat of the Alpine Convention Agustín García-Ureta with Iñaki Lasagabaster and Iñigo Lazcano Secretary General: Marco Onida www.alpconv.org p. 147 IV - Implementation of Environmental Legislation & Policy: [email protected] Case Studies from the Alps Main office in Innsbruck: p. 148 Implementing the Alpine Convention: The Austrian Experience - Ewald Galle Herzog-Friedrich Strasse 15 A-6020 Innsbruck - Austria p. 152 Mountains of Problems: Alpine traffic and International Law - Werner Schroeder Branch office in Bolzano/Bozen: p. 162 Protected Alpine Areas: Goals and Limits of Legal Protection - Sebastian Schmid Drususallee 1/Viale Druso 1 p. 170 The Use of Motor Vehicles in the Alps - Liliana Dagostin I-39100 Bozen/Bolzano - Italy p. 178 The Use of Helicopters for Leisure Purposes in the Alps - Jennifer Heuck p. 190 The Action Plan on Climate Change in the Alps: ISBN: 9788890515859 Mirroring Reality or Encouraging a Common Alpine Vision? - Patricia Quillacq © Permanent Secretariat of the Alpine Convention, 2011 p. 203 List of Contributors 4 5 Introduction Introduction Introduction The second part of the volume enters deeper into the subject of the adequacy of international and European environmental law to deal with the specific problems and challenges faced by mountainous regions. Karl Weber examines the value of the 2000 European Union (EU) Water Framework Directive (WFD) for the Alps, and takes a precise look at its This collection of essays discusses and tries to answer the question whether environmental benefits and gaps by assessing the relevant Austrian legislation through the lens of the law is sufficiently adapted to respond to the specific environmental challenges faced by WFD provisions. Astrid Epiney and Jennifer Heuck address the interesting yet little known mountain ecosystems. This issue was the subject of an international conference held in topic of the relationship between the Swiss approach to mountain protection and the EU April 2010 that gathered all the contributors in Innsbruck (Austria) on the initiative of legal framework, focusing on transport. The development and use of genetically modified the Permanent Secretariat of the Alpine Convention in cooperation with the Institute for organisms (GMOs) in agriculture opens infinite and fascinating discussion on the role of European and International Law of the University of Innsbruck and with the support of science and technology, and about the friction and incongruence between environmental the Slovenian Ministry for the Environment and Spatial Planning (Presidency of the Alpine law and trade law, especially in the context of the European Union. Gerd Winter pinpoints Convention 2009-2011), the Austrian Ministry for the Environment (Lebensministerium) and delicate issues regarding the use of GMOs in the Alps, where plots have modest dimensions, the Province of Tyrol. where products are strongly linked to the territory and tradition, and where the minimum distance requirements between GMO-based crops and traditional farming are difficult if The theme is complex and both the discussion at the conference and corresponding written not impossible to ensure. Another example of conflicting interests between environmental papers represent an important contribution to the legal reflection applied to mountains protection and economic activities, and the difficulty for law to provide instruments to protection. Beneath the main question, another appears in each of the contributions, either balance those interests is given in the contribution of Borut Šantej, who discusses the role for the Alps or for other European mountain ranges: how can a country with mountain of spatial planning and land use decisions, particularly to help prevent and remedy rural regions fulfill the challenge of combining a multi-layered legislation to protect that part of sprawl in mountainous and hilly areas in Slovenia. Elisa Morgera’s contribution concludes its territory? Mountainous regions do not, in fact, necessarily correspond to administrative the second section by questioning and comparing the provisions of the Alpine Convention and political borders. This is indeed one of the reasons why a specific Treaty was crafted and the Convention on Biological Diversity intended to ensure mountain populations obtain and adopted in 1991 for the Alps (the Alpine Convention) and a similar one in 2003 for the a fair economic gain for themselves without exhausting the natural resources, or even better, Carpathians (the Carpathian Convention). It is important to discuss what the role of such through their conservation, paving the way to sustainable development. mountain-based treaties is and whether there is a need to extend this approach to other mountain ranges (e.g. the Pyrenees). The third part of this publication focuses on the “range-approach”, which concerns the adoption of international treaties that have as their territorial scope the entire area of the Each contribution in this volume presents an element of the puzzle. To set the scene, mountain range they seek to protect. The Alpine Convention was a benchmark in this sense, the first section provides an historical perspective on environmental legislation, recalling opening the way to others. Marco Onida highlights the weaknesses but also the strengths important features in that field, which are either not known or easily forgotten. Cristina of the Alpine Convention and its implementing Protocols, pointing in particular to their wide Joanaz de Melo uncovers some of the reasons for the timing of State intervention through and inter-sectoral scope of application. Pier Carlo Sandei presents the specificities of the forestation in the Alpine environment in the 19th century, such as Nation-State consolidation Carpathian Convention, a “sister” convention of the Alpine Convention, underlining its own processes, the need to find solutions to torrential floods or to reduce river poisoning and specific methods, which differentiate the two international treaties beyond the fact that they improve workers’welfare. Ludwig Krämer presents an insightful analysis of the treatment share the range approach and sustainable development goals. The exercise of comparing the of mountains in the short history of nature conservation law, leading to some conclusions methods, approaches and tools of these two regimes could be of great use to those planning about the usefulness and form of new instruments to protect specifically mountainous areas new mountain-based treaties, such as in the Dynaric-Balkan regions, or the Pyrenees, as and ecosystems. presented respectively by Tanja Bogotaj and Agustín García-Ureta, in both cases with rich 6 7 Introduction List of abbreviations references to the specificities of those ranges and the need for legal protection. Mountain ranges face common threats, but every mountain chain is unique due to its internal political List of abbreviations divisions, cultures, languages, and economic development characteristics. The existing mountain conventions and the ones in gestation demonstrate that solutions have to be specifically crafted in and for each mountain region. The last part of the book concentrates on several case-studies concerning the Alps, looking ACE Alpine Crossing Exchange (Alpentransitbörse) at how national law applies and complies with international norms such as those codified ATE Alpine Transit Entities in the Alpine Convention. In Ewald Galle’s article, Austria appears as a fore-runner in terms ATR Alpine Transit Rights of implementation, compliance with, and enforcement

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