23-04-2025
Dept seeks tenders for Ireland's nature restoration plan
The Department of Housing, Local Government and Heritage is seeking tenders for technical support services for Ireland's national nature restoration plan.
Under the European Union's Nature Restoration Law, all member states must prepare a national restoration plan (NRP).
This plan will set out the specific restoration targets for the habitats, species and ecosystems, as well as the measures required to reach those targets.
The department said that the successful tenderer will assist the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS) in quantifying habitats and species targets and identifying necessary measures to meet the requirements of the plan.
Nature restoration
According to the tender documents, preparation is underway on National Conservation Assessments (NCAs) for 59 habitats and 68 species or species groups listed in the Habitats Directive.
Any habitat or species that is reported as being in less than favourable conservation status will come into scope of the NRP, requiring restoration measures to be put in place and specific targets to be met.
The NPWS is currently developing templates in order to record information for relevant habitats and species, which will then feed into the NRP.
The deadline for the submission of Ireland's draft NRP to the European Commission is September 2026.
Nature restoration
The successful tenderer will be required to review the results of the NCAs and develop an understanding of the underlying datasets.
They will closely work with the NPWS to finalise the standardised templates for quantifying targets and setting out how to achieve them.
The tenderer will participate in workshops/meetings with NPWS 'in order to explain and develop approaches, encourage collaboration and disseminate results'.
The documents state there will be 'a degree of flexibility in relation to days/hours worked per week' and that the contractor should provide pricing for 200 days between quarter two (Q2) 2025 and quarter four (Q4) 2026.
The deadline for the submission of tenders is 5:00p.m on Monday, May 12, 2025.
Nature credits
Meanwhile, the European Commission today (Wednesday, April 23) hosted a 'high-level roundtable' meeting focused on developing biodiversity certification and nature credits as tools to finance nature restoration.
European Commissioner for the Environment Jessika Roswall met with environmental, business, and financial stakeholders in Brussels.
The meeting explored the need to develop a sound and credible methodology, innovative strategies to grow the nature credits market, as well as ways to boost private sector investment and biodiversity conservation.
The roundtable also examined key drivers of demand for nature credits in the corporate and financial sectors.
The outcome of the meeting will feed into the process of developing EU action on nature credits.
