Landscape diversity in the European Union
As part of its ongoing work to develop indicators to monitor the integration of environmental concerns into the common agricultural policy, the European Commission has published a report entitled 'From land cover to landscape diversity in the European Union'. This follows a call from the Agricultural Council in July 1999 for a Commission report on agri-environmental indicators and a more recent Commission communication to the Council and the European Parliament on this subject. The report uses existing data on land cover to develop indicators which could be used, for example, to track changes in European landscapes in terms of diversity. 'Such indicators will be particularly important in ensuring the success of monitoring, control and evaluation of the efforts made to integrate environmental concerns into the common agricultural policy', says the Commission. The publication results from close collaboration between the Agriculture, Directorate-General, Eurostat and the Joint Research Centre, as well as the European Environmental Agency. It is available on the Commission website at: URL: http://europa.eu.int/comm/dg06/publi/landscape/index.htm