Listen to Alan Hepburn talking about Scotland’s rewilding journey. Alan is a life-long environmentalist, who fought for a moratorium on whale hunting in the early eighties and today faces urgent challenges to reverse biodiversity decline and combat climate change. A teacher and a trustee of SCOTLAND: The Big Picture, Scotland’s rewilding charity, he works to ensure that young people have their voice heard when discussing the future of the natural environment in Scotland.
SCOTLAND: The Big Picture has just released an exciting new film Why Not Scotland. The film asks an important question about the future of Scotland: – Across mainland Europe, nature is making a dramatic recovery. Wildlife is returning, forests are expanding, rivers are being set free and wetlands restored. As nature bounces back, people are returning too, finding new economic opportunities and enjoying the many benefits of a revitalised landscape.
So, if rewilding can happen in Italy, Germany, Poland and Norway, could Scotland be next?
As this new film launches I thought it would be good to ask Alan where he thinks we are in this journey.
Alan Hepburn
John D. Burns – If you walk in the hills of Scotland, as I do, you’ll know that there are vast swathes of landscape laid waste as Driven Grouse moors or or kept as barren sporting estates for the sport of rich men who enjoy stalking deer. Sometimes I find myself losing heart when I think about the sheer scale of the task involved in re-introducing the wild into this enormous landscape.
It is easy to forget what has been achieved and to overlook the big plans for Scotland’s future that groups like SCOTLAND: The Big Picture are campaigning for. In all this destruction I sometimes have to make myself remember that things are changing. There are beaver living in the rivers of Scotland, something that has not happened for over three hundred years. You can go to the Island of Mull and see the great outstretched wings of a Sea Eagle sweeping across the Sound of Mull. All this could support a thriving economy based on sustainable projects that could revitalise many parts of the Highlands. WHY NOT SCOTLAND
This is my novel, Sky Dance, that raises many of the issues Alan and I spoke about. Get your copy here
Get your copy of this fascinating and important book here