YORKSHIRE Dales National Park Authority chief executive David Butterworth looks forward to the challenges and opportunities of a new year

AS we move from 2015 into 2016 my thoughts turn to some of the challenges and opportunities facing the Yorkshire Dales National Park, and its communities in the New Year.

The political and financial context for the national park authority has considerably improved in recent months. The government’s decision to extend the park boundary and the commitment to protect the budgets of national parks and Areas of Outstanding Natural Beauty (AONBs) through to 2020 is welcome news.

Much of the credit for this should go to the new national parks’ minister, Rory Stewart, who has been like a breath of fresh air within Defra as he starts to deliver on his ministerial portfolio. He’s obviously been pre-occupied with events in Cumbria in recent weeks and our thoughts go out to those communities who received an early Christmas present they could well have done without.

Credit also goes to the Chancellor, George Osborne, and local MP, Julian Smith, who visited the national park earlier in the year for an early evening news ‘hi-vis jacket opportunity’. They must obviously have been impressed by the national park’s apprentices who gave them a demonstration of dry-stone walling because the visit was followed by the Chancellor’s announcement on the budget.

Looking forward to 2016, the issues facing our local communities don’t seem to alter: affordable housing; access to services; and, the future of upland livestock farming. All of these are critical to the well-being of the area. All have been equally difficult to address in the past and look as though they might be more so in the future.

There is a continuing debate about whether we should simply leave it to ‘the market’ to provide for our local housing needs and services, or whether there is a need to ‘intervene if some of those needs are not being met. From where I’m sitting, the market forces argument is winning at the moment, certainly at a national level. That looks likely to mean a more difficult future for some within our communities – although the government’s intervention in the market for broadband is now making a real difference in some of our remote rural areas.

The other chink of light appears when local communities come together to take control of these issues where they can. For example, some of the work by local communities in Upper Wharfedale has been particularly impressive over the past year.

The future viability of upland livestock farming is something that concerns the Dales National Park Authority immensely. The cuts to funding for schemes like Countryside Stewardship in the coming years may make it more difficult for some of our farmers to continue the sort of ‘High Nature Value’ farming practices that the public value so much. We want to ensure that dales farmers continue to produce high quality products – not least the milk for our wonderful Wensleydale Cheese - as well as maintaining some of the most wonderful landscapes in the country. We might only have a small role in this particular agenda but we are working with other partners on several potentially exciting projects that we hope will come to fruition in the New Year.

Recent weeks have seen quite a lot of discussion about fracking and how it might impact on land management. Some would say that this national park is in a rather fortunate position because our geology means the opportunities for shale gas fracking are very limited. Some of my colleagues in other national parks will not be quite so fortunate. Having just gone through the potash application, the North York Moors National Park must look forward with some trepidation about the uncertainty around the potential impact of fracking. It will be interesting to see how local communities react to this new ‘job creation opportunity’.

On a more positive note, much of our attention next year will be focused on implementing the government’s commitment to extend the boundaries of the national park. I believe this represents a clear commitment to the environment. These new areas will bring into the park some fantastic landscapes, wonderful examples of the built and cultural heritage, but also a number of issues. We look forward to these challenges and opportunities because if we, and others, get it right we can really see the delivery of environmental, social and economic benefits that accrue to the area as a result of national park status.

Staying with ‘green’ issues, it has been really pleasing to see that this national park is bucking the national trend of declines in wildlife, with positive news about several of our iconic species like Black Grouse, Red Squirrels and wading birds. Other than some well publicised issues around some raptor species, many bird, plant and animal species continue to flourish. No complacency but good news.

An exciting year ahead, we will try to play our part.