Cultured nature: The Nature Scenery Act of the Netherlands

When thinking of national parks most people think of famous
examples like Yellow Stone and Yosemite in the United States or
the Serengeti in Tanzania. These parks are large in scale with an
emphasis on wild life conservation and the preservation of scenic
landscapes. Human activity and presence are restricted and
regulated and people are visitors.


In smaller and densely populated countries like Britain or the
Netherlands, the creation of large national parks is complicated.
In these countries landscapes are far from natural and humans are
part of the fabric of the landscape. For this reason, it is
difficult to restrict human access and activities to create
national parks.


In the Netherlands nature and human activity are almost
inseparable because about half of the country is at or below sea
level and is reclaimed or drained. Consequently, the landscape of
the Netherlands is mostly the product of human
intervention and can therefore be described as a
cultural artefact. As a result, formal protection of
landscapes and wildlife came late. One of the early attempts to
create protected conservation areas came in 1928 with
the Natuurschoonwet, freely translated as Nature Scenery
Act. This Act was mostly about protecting country houses set in
park like settings.


Wybren Verstegen, Senior Lecturer in economic, social and
environmental history at the Free University Amsterdam has
researched the Dutch Nature Scenery Act. On this episode of the
podcast he discusses the Scenery Act and puts it in an
international perspective. Wybren suggests that as an area
of study, landed estates have been overlooked  by
environmental historians.


Music credits


"Southern Delight" by Stefan Kartenberg,
available from ccMixter


"soaring" by urmymuse, available from
ccMixter