On the role of agricultural landscapes for the improvement of the Natura2000 network: a multi-level approach for informing local Green Infrastructure planning

The European Biodiversity Strategy for 2030 is triggering significant investments in Green Infrastructure (GI) for enhancing ecological connectivity, especially between EU Natura2000 (N2K) sites scattered across highly anthropized landscapes. In agricultural matrices, although GI actions can improve the role of agroecosystems in supporting N2K functionality, priority deployment needs are still poorly investigated across Europe. Since well-planned networks of natural and semi-natural linear elements (LE) could enhance biodiversity and connectivity, these elements are among the landscape features to be increased in agricultural lands. At a finer detail of investigation, LE themselves can be considered ecosystem subtypes with varying conditions, but a comprehensive methodology is still needed to assess their capacity to support biodiversity. This study aims to address these gaps by (i) categorizing NUTS3 in W-Mediterranean Europe based on N2K network features, landscape composition, and environmental heterogeneity, (ii) identifying N2K-related GI deployment needs with respect to nodes (protected areas) and links (residual woody elements in arable land), (iii) proposing an assessment method for LE conditions focused on biodiversitysupport capacity and based on different structural, compositional and landscape indicators, (iv) exploring extrinsic factors that potentially affect LE conditions (contiguity to protected habitats and governance frameworks), and (v) identifying key LE features to be restored. This landscape ecology approach allows challenges posed by land-use and climatic changes to be effectively addressed under a multilevel perspective. On the one hand, four GI deployment needs were identified and spatialized: restoring connectivity, consolidating node and link conservation, creating new protected areas, and expanding N2K sites. On the other hand, the proposed LE condition assessment method was tested in eight NUTS3 in Italy and Spain, where structural continuity was found to be the most important feature to be restored. The two levels of analysis are both useful for informing subsequent local actions aimed at N2K network improvement.