Date: 13 May 2008
Venue: London
Speakers: Jeremy Sumeray (Chair), UK Green Building Council; Dr. Tony Mitchell-Jones, Natural England; Fiona Mahon, Wildlife Trusts; Roland Spikings, KIER

Description: The Government has made clear that the construction industry needs to demonstrate leadership on sustainable development. The sustainable construction strategy identifies four shared priorities across the UK that has strong resonance within the sustainable construction agenda. One such priority area is environmental enhancement which will include biodiversity.

Biodiversity is an area that directly affects the construction industry and can cause considerable delays to the delivery of projects and significant consequences on biodiversity value when not considered early in the design stage. The provision of biodiversity has been shown to add economic and social benefits and as such can give added value to any development or project.

Despite an increased awareness, for many in industry, biodiversity still tends to be less understood and often receives minimal consideration until the project is adversely affected through a lack of earlier consideration. This workshop addressed all these related issues.

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