Natural Environment (Scotland) Bill: external engagement sessions - summary report

1. Overview

1.1 Background and objectives of engagement sessions

The Scottish Government held three webinar sessions with external stakeholders to provide an overview of policy progress, updates on the Natural Environment (Scotland) Bill, governance, monitoring and evaluation as well as future engagement opportunities. The sessions were designed to help integrate biodiversity and environmental sustainability into policy across the Scottish Government along with informing and engaging with external stakeholders. This was the first in a series of engagement sessions to help support the policy development of statutory nature restoration targets.

The sessions were 30 minutes and included a presentation with a question and answer section.

The presentation covered an overview of the Statutory Nature Restoration Targets under the Natural Environment (Scotland) Bill, including the 4-step process to developing targets which is being adopted with input from RESAS and the Programme Advisory Group (PAG). This also included outlining the legislative framework, target-setting process and engagement opportunities. It also outlined key legislative framework including what the targets will focus on, the reporting timeline and that Environmental Standards Scotland (ESS) as the independent review body (IRB). Next steps were covered with internal and external engagement proposed throughout the timeline.

Prior to the engagement sessions an MS teams form was collated for attendees to complete. The form asked six questions to gauge understanding of the policy area, their interest in attending as well as an option to sign up for the mailing list to receive updates.