“Scotland leads the world in climate targets, but lags behind in climate defence.”
Ariane Burgess, Scottish Green MSP for the Highlands and Islands
Campaigners gathered outside Holyrood yesterday to demand that rewilding be a critical part of Scotland’s response to wildfire, flooding and droughts. Tying their climate hopes and fears on a washing line outside the Scottish Parliament, their calls came as MSPs gathered to debate the role of nature-based solutions – such as rewetting peatlands and restored wetlands – in building long-term landscape-scale resilience to increasingly frequent climate shocks.
“Wildfires, flooding and drought are not separate, isolated disasters – they’re all climate shocks, and degraded landscapes are leaving us more vulnerable to all three,” said Charlotte Maddix, Advocacy Coordinator for the Scottish Rewilding Alliance, which organised the rally.
“As the frequency and severity of extreme weather events in Scotland increases, we need immediate action to make our landscapes and communities more resilient – and rewilding must play a key part.”
Ariane Burgess, Scottish Green Party MSP for the Highlands and Islands region, led yesterday’s debate in the Scottish Parliament. She believes it’s time to shift focus from emergency response alone towards Scotland’s long term resilience to climate change, through the creation of a dedicated fund and landscape summit.
“Scotland leads the world in climate targets, but lags behind in climate defence,” said Burgess. “Government policy has treated landscape adaptation as a balancing act between stakeholders, but we’re out of time.”
“We know that wildfires, droughts and flooding will intensify in the future as a result of climate breakdown. These extreme events are already forcing radical changes on communities – they can destroy the homes we live in, decimate the food we grow and burn through our most precious wild landscapes.”
“We also know that well managed land can mitigate these impacts enormously. Healthy nature should be our first line of defence.”
“What Scotland urgently needs is a Climate Shock Fund to increase funding and scale up the nature-based solutions we know will protect us in the future, in addition to a national Landscape Resilience Summit to break through the political gridlock,” she continued.
“By bringing together land managers, emergency services, scientists, communities and policy makers at a Scottish Landscape Resilience Summit, we can take collective knowledge and turn it into collective action – reducing fire and flood risk today while building a safer, more resilient Scotland for the future. It’s time for investment alongside open and honest conversations about the way forward.”
