SRA Annual Report 202-23: Strategic Approach to Mitigation
With an eye to the future, Natural England – as a partner in the SRA – is developing what is called a Strategic Approach to Mitigation for projects on the Somerset Levels and Moors.
Its five main objectives are:
- to reduce costs and risks;
- enable projects to go ahead;
- secure environmental benefits;
- support local community, farming, business and tourism interests;
- and satisfy local and national policies.
To help root these ambitions in fertile evidence, the British Trust for Ornithology has completed an analysis of wintering bird data.
Two other reports by Natural England are nearly finished. These cover Functionally Linked Land (areas of land or sea outside the boundaries of designated sites but critical to the success of those sites), and future alternatives to Raised Water Level Areas (RWLAs). RWLAS are areas of land engineered so that water levels can be held higher than they are in surrounding areas. This is done to provide better breeding and wintering conditions for waders and wildfowl inhabiting the Somerset Levels and Moors.
In December 2022, consultants JBA began researching a possible framework for the updating of Water Level Management Plans.
As a result of all this work, Natural England says it will be able to assess the impacts of flood defence schemes more easily, give stronger advice about necessary mitigation activities and understand better where conservation efforts should be made now to bring benefits in future.