LINK Thinks

LINK Thinks is a space for members and others to express their views about Scotland’s environment. If you would like to contribute a blog please contact information@scotlink.org. The opinions expressed in this blog are the author's and not necessarily those of the wider LINK membership.

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Invasive Non-Native Species: Should all Nature be Championed?

18 May 2022

Invasive Species Week  The international community is facing twin emergencies: climate change and biodiversity loss. These entangled crises demand swift action from policymakers and Nicola Sturgeon’s recent commitment to showing leadership on both crises is very welcomed. Tackling the nature crisis can feel even more complex than the climate crisis and yet it is paramount […]

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Land and People in Scotland: the new Cairngorms National Park Plan

06 May 2022

Land and People in Scotland: the new Cairngorms National Park Plan showing the way in this Decade of Ecosystem Restoration Despite its status as the birthplace of John Muir – ‘the patron saint of national parks’ – Scotland arrived late on the scene.  More than a century behind the USA, and half a century behind […]

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Wake-up Call

26 Apr 2022

Since the 1970s our global consumption of natural resources has tripled – taking a devastating toll on our planet. Our lifestyles and ever-increasing appetite for raw materials have now destroyed [i]two-thirds of the world’s rainforests, [ii]half the coral reefs, and [iii]87% of all wetlands. A staggering [iv]90 percent of the world’s biodiversity loss has been […]

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Nature and farming: where next for both?

21 Apr 2022

Farming has profoundly shaped Scotland: our people, our economy, our traditions, our landscapes and our wildlife. Nature is also a key part of Scotland’s identity. In a 2019 survey for Scottish Environment LINK, 94 percent of the Scottish public saw our natural environment as ‘very important’ or ‘quite important’ to both Scotland’s economy and its […]

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Fostering Connection between Parliament and Nature

20 Apr 2022

“To save wildlife and wild places the traction has to come not from the regurgitation of bad-news data but from the poets, prophets, preachers, professors, and presidents who have always dared to inspire.” J. Drew Lanham   Scotland currently ranks 28th from the bottom in the Biodiversity Intactness Index (RSPB & Natural History Museum, 2021). […]

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From Rhetoric to Reality revisited: a new report

11 Apr 2022

In 2011, LINK published our first Rhetoric to Reality assessment. In it, we commissioned an independent consultant to assess 8 key areas of environmental policy on how far reality on the ground had matched the rhetoric of policy. Now, ten years on, we’ve commissioned another assessment. A decadal review seems timely: it covers the life […]

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Positive by nature: Planning for nature to meet net-zero 

28 Mar 2022

Today, we are facing twin emergencies: climate change and biodiversity loss.   “The climate crisis is inseparable from the nature and biodiversity crisis. Scotland has a duty to show leadership on both.” Rt. Hon. Nicola Sturgeon MSP, Sept 2021   Since COP26 in Glasgow in 2021, we have witnessed a very welcome focus on net-zero and […]

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NPF4: can it transform our transport systems?

21 Mar 2022

By Malachy Clarke, Public Affairs Manager for Friends of the Earth Scotland and a member of LINK’s Planning Group. Transport is Scotland’s biggest source of climate emission, accounting for over one-third of all emissions. It will be impossible for the Scottish Government to meet their proposed 75% reduction in emissions by 2030 without taking radical […]

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Farming for the future and food security

17 Mar 2022

The events in Ukraine are shocking and the ongoing acts of aggression against Ukraine and its people are truly terrible. The daily news images are clearly tragic. We all stand in solidarity and support for the people of Ukraine.  The impact on global food production is another pressure on our planet, heaped upon the existential […]

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