ECRAN Expert Mission on Natura 2000 Appropriate Assessment
Date: 12.09.2016
Place: Belgrade, Serbia
Organizer: ECRAN Secretariat with EC TAIEX Unit
As a part of pre-accession preparatory process, Serbia has transposed major part of the provisions of
both Birds and Habitats Directives including Natura 2000 network. The most important protective
tool for future Natura 2000 network is the Appropriate Assessment (AA) pursuant to Art. 6(3) of the
Habitats Directive which requires particularly careful transposition. Full transposition of Art. 6(3) is
one of the indicators of meeting the obligations in the field of nature protection.
Serbia amended its Nature Protection Act with the provisions enabling to establish Natura 2000 as
early as in 2010 but without AA: there was just a reference to a by-law to be drafted within a certain
period. This by-law, however, has never been drafted due to some unclarities regarding Natura 2000
establishment.
In 2015, amendments to Nature Protection Act finally removed those unclarities, and competent
authority finally prepared the draft of the Government decree on AA. However, due to lack of
experience the draft by-law, although conceptually good, contains a number of details which require
clarification with the competent authority – Ministry of Agriculture and Environment. This
consultation which has preliminarily been agreed with that Ministry should be the aim of the
envisaged expert mission.
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