Public Institution “Priroda”

Organisation of the Public Institution “Priroda”

At present, the Public Institution “Priroda” has nine employees organised into three units:

  • The Office of the Director,
  • Professional Services Unit,
  • Supervision Unit.

The Office of the Director is engaged in managing the Institution and coordinating the activities of its units, while the Professional Services Unit and the Supervision Unit are engaged in the professional activities of environmental protection and supervision of the County’s protected areas.

The Professional Services Unit activities in managing protected natural areas involve:

  • Gathering and processing data
  • Creating a database on protected natural areas
  • Monitoring the level of conservation
  • Proposing protection measures
  • Preparing professional background studies for managing and using natural resources
  • Conducting statistical analyses
  • Compiling reports on the state of environmental protection
  • Preparing projects and putting them into action
  • Organising and carrying out educational and promotional activities in environmental protection
  • Issuing concession licences and guardianship agreements
  • Management activities based on management plans, Ordinance on Internal Order, protection measures or measures relating to spatial planning documents.

The Supervision Unit is responsible for overseeing how objectives are accomplished and protection measures, enforced in a specific protected area. Based on legal regulations, this Unit can, among other things, undertake the following activities in protected areas:

  • Temporarily dispossess an individual of any illegally taken part of living or nonliving nature that belongs to a protected area
  • Demand of an individual to provide some form of identification
  • Conduct a search of an individual’s luggage, vehicle or vessel
  • Dispense and collect fines and penalties
  • Require restoration of the original conditions.

Goals of Nature and Biodiversity Protection in the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County

The specific goal of environmental protection in the field of nature and biodiversity production is to preserve the existing richness of biological and landscape diversity in the County and to continuously care for its conservation.

Activities and Tasks of the Public Institution “Priroda”

The basic guidelines for organising the activities and tasks of the Public Institution “Priroda” relating to the management of protected areas in the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County:

  • Putting in place a system for managing protected natural areas
  • Setting up an institutional framework for cooperation with the competent State Institute for Nature Protection, state and county bodies, local self-government units and related institutions and interest groups
  • Protecting valuable natural heritage proposed for protection in spatial plans
  • Inventorying, evaluating and monitoring the natural heritage
  • Participating in the execution of international agreements on nature protection and taking part in international projects and cooperation networks
  • Educating the public on the importance and value of the natural heritage and carrying out educational and promotional activities in nature protection, and
  • Valuating the natural heritage for tourism and recreational activities.

Activities involved in preserving the rich natural resources of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County:

  • Undertaking measures to maintain and increase the numbers within populations of threatened species and to preserve and rehabilitate their habitats
  • Preventing the introduction of invasive species and mitigating the effects in cases where invasive organisms are already present
  • Preserving the biological diversity of rare types of habitats and vegetation (bogs, floodplain and wetland habitats, cliffs, screes, sub-alpine grasslands, sea shores, crags and islets)
  • Encouraging farming activities upon which the preservation of the biological and landscape diversity depends
  • Preserving the numbers and diversity of endemic and rare plants and wildlife
  • Preserving the biological diversity of forests
  • Preserving the habitats of amphibians
  • Preserving the habitats and corridors vital to migratory animals
  • Restraining harmful anthropogenic factors impacting on the destruction of bogs
  • Preventing the illegal poisoning of protected island wildlife
  • Preventing the harmful effects resulting from the introduction of allochthonous wild animals
  • Preserving the diverse types of grasslands and preventing them from becoming overgrown
  • Preventing the degradation of the underground karst
  • Preserving the wetlands
  • Preventing the unauthorised gathering of rare and protected plants, animals and mushrooms
  • Preventing the loss in the genetic diversity of indigenous sorts and breeds.
  • Mapping underground karst habitats and protecting their living world and geological heritage
  • Preserving karst watercourses (rivers and streams)
  • Preventing the destruction of coastal habitats as a result of rapid tourism development
  • Preserving the coraligenous biocenosis of the seabed
  • Preserving the fields of marine flowering plants
  • Preserving the dolphin population
  • Mapping and preserving underwater caves
  • Preventing the degradation of biodiversity as a result of pollution of the water area
  • Mitigating degradation caused by eutrophication of the sea
  • Preventing the destruction of seafloor fauna communities (especially certain types of mussels)
  • Preventing the degradation of fjords
  • Preventing the degradation of the seabed due to rapid tourism development
  • Monitoring change over time and measuring the effects of action plans carried out
  • Ensuring the monitoring of wetland habitats and other types of rare and threatened habitats (for example, bogs)
  • Providing continuous educational programs for all population age groups and structures
  • Providing hunters with greater knowledge and information on the need to preserve biological and landscape diversity
  • Studies to establish priority in the protection of valuable natural areas on land
  • Background studies prior to the legal procedure of proclaiming protecting areas of valuable natural heritage proposed for protection
  • Decisions on the protection of and measures for protecting parts of valuable natural heritage proposed for protection
  • Protection measures for protected natural heritage for which such measures have yet not been adopted
  • Management plans for protected natural heritage

Supervision of Valuable Natural Areas in the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County

Together with the conservation inspectors of the Sector for Nature Protection Inspectional Supervision of the Ministry of Environment and Energy, the supervision/ranger units of public institutions are responsible for the supervision of a County’s valuable natural areas and all of its other segments of nature protection.

In case of emergency, should you observe any type of degradation taking place in the valuable and protected areas of the County, IMMEDIATELY CALL THESE NUMBERS:

  • In cases where action should be taken in an event relating to plants, animals and their habitats, regardless of the area in which the event has occurred, please call 051/311-302 or 098/406-313,
  • In the protected areas of the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County, please call 051/352-400 (Administration of the Public Institution “Priroda”) or 091/1352-400
  • In the territory of the Risnjak National Park, please call 051/836-133 (Administration) or 099/3828-443
  • In the territory of the Učka Nature Park, please call 051/293-753 (Administration)

The following section presents the coverage of protected nature areas and the full addresses, telephone numbers and contact persons in the State body and competent institutions for managing protected nature areas:

  • STATE INSPECTORATE OF REPUBLIC OF CROATIA - SECTOR FOR NATURE PROTECTION SUPERVISION

    Phone: 051/325-776, Fax: 051/325-784
    Mob: 098/406-313
    E-mail: ivanka.jelenic@mzoip.hr

  • PUBLIC INSTITUTION RISNJAK NATIONAL PARK

    Bijela vodica 48, 51317 Bijela Vodica – Crni Lug
    Phone: 051/836-133, 051/836-246, Fax: 051/836-116

    SUPERVISION SERVICES UNIT
    Tel: 051/836-133
    Mob: 099/348 0001
    e-mail: nadzor@risnjak.hr

    The territory of the Park covers the mountain ranges of Planina, Guslica, Snježnik and Risnjak across Bijele Vodice at Crni Lug to the village of Razloge and the area at the source of the River Kupa.

  • PUBLIC INSTITUTION UČKA NATURE PARK

    Liganj 42, 51415 Lovran
    Phone: 051/293-753, Phone/Fax: 051/293-751

    The Nature Park stretches across the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County and the Istria County.

    In the Primorje-Gorski Kotar County the boundaries of the Park are the Planika mountain range and the environs of Vedež (a town near Veprinac) to the north, and the area around Sisol Peak and Sveta Jelena (a town near Brseč) to the south.

  • PUBLIC INSTITUTION ''PRIRODA''

    Grivica 4, 51000 Rijeka
    Phone: 051/352-400, Fax: 051/352-401

    SUPERVISION SERVICES UNIT
    Phone: 051/352-411
    Mob: 091/1352-400
    E-mail: marko.modric@ju-priroda.hr

    The Public Institution “Priroda” is responsible for and manages

MEMBERSHIPS

MedPAN

Javna ustanova “Priroda” tijekom 2012. godine postala je članicom MedPAN organizacije. Organizacija umrežuje institucije koje upravljaju morskim zaštićenim područjima na Mediteranu, a glavni joj je cilj unaprjeđenje upravljanja morskim zaštićenim područjima. MedPAN organizacija je osnovana na konferenciji u Monaku 1990. godine uz potporu Svjetske banke. Današnji model upravljanja MedPAN-om kao neprofitnom organizacijom definiran je 2008. godine, kada je koordinacija i prikupljanje sredstava za MedPAN organizaciju dodijeljeno francuskom ogranku Svjetskog fonda za zaštitu prirode (WWF, World Wildlife Fund). Danas se pod okriljem MedPAN-a nalazi se više od 50 članova iz 18 zemalja diljem Mediterana, koji upravljaju sa više od 80 morskih zaštićenih područja. MedPAN organizacija raspolaže određenim sredstvima koja dodjeljuje članovima kroz različite projektne natječaje.

AdriaPAN

AdriaPAN, Jadranska mreža zaštićenih područja, je inicijativa koju su započele dvije talijanske institucije koje upravljaju zaštićenim područjima: Miramare i Torre del Cerrano. Cilj mreže je uspostavljanje kontakta i trajne suradnje između institucijama koje upravljaju zaštićenim područjima u Jadranskoj regiji. Glavne aktivnosti koje potiče AdriaPAN organizacija pripadaju sferi zaštite okoliša i održivog razvoja. Organizacija broji više od 20 članova iz svih zemalja koje imaju izlaz na Jadransko more, te više od 30 pridruženih članova (institucije, tvrtke, nevladine organizacije i sl.).