Twenty Years of Spanish Geoparks: Analysis and Future Prospects
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REVIEW ARTICLE
Twenty Years of Spanish Geoparks: Analysis and Future Prospects Asier Hilario Orús 1 & Luis Carcavilla Urquí 2 Received: 14 May 2020 / Accepted: 16 September 2020 # The European Association for Conservation of the Geological Heritage 2020
Abstract Considering the number of UNESCO Global Geoparks, Spain is the second country in the world and the first country in Europe. This paper describes the historical development and the current reality of Spanish Geoparks with a geographical, geological, administrative and sociological analysis and explains the main reasons that have contributed to the successful spread of Spanish UNESCO Global Geoparks. This analysis describes also the main challenges for the future and introduces a fundamental question that will have to be discussed in many countries with an important number of Geoparks: the criteria to define a sustainable number of UNESCO Global Geoparks (UGGp) at the national level. The representativeness of the national geological main features and its geological heritage in UGGp is one the main factors that can contribute to defining a well-balanced and impartial strategy for a sustainable growth. Thus, the relevance of a national geosite inventory rises up as one of the important tools to organize a coherent national distribution and to help on the definition of the boundaries of UGGp. Keywords Geoparks . Spain . Geological heritage . Networking . UNESCO
Introduction UNESCO Global Geoparks are single, unified geographical areas where sites and landscapes of international geological significance are managed with a holistic concept of protection, education and sustainable development (UNESCO 2016, 2020). Geological heritage is evaluated and considered from the inhabitants’ perspective, presence and needs (McKeever and Zouros 2005), and it is used together with other natural and cultural values to promote local development through geotourism, education and territorial identity. One of the most important Geopark’s strength is their bottom-up approach that must consider the participation and involvement of local communities. The idea of Geoparks was developed in 1996 but was in 2000 when representatives of four European territories, which had separately been promoting geological conservation and * Asier Hilario Orús [email protected] Luis Carcavilla Urquí [email protected] 1
Basque Coast UNESCO Global Geopark, Ifar Kalea 4, 20820 Deba, Spain
2
Spanish Geological Survey (IGME), Madrid, Spain
sustainable development, signed a convention declaring the creation of the European Geoparks Network (EGN) (Zouros and Martini 2003; McKeever and Zouros 2005). In 2004, the EGN was opened to non-European territories including eight Chinese Geoparks and creating the Global Geoparks Network (GGN). The “Madonie Declaration” was also signed in 2004 re-affirming the previous agreement (2001) of cooperation between the Division of Earth Sciences of UNESCO and the GGN (Eder and Zouros 2004; McKeever and Zouros 2005). This cooperation was consolidated in 2015 when the 1
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