Aggtelek National Park

The Aggtelek National Park in north eastern Hungary is a large area of species-rich grasslands and deciduous woodlands on a limestone ‘karst’ landscape. It is part of the Gömör-Torna Karst National Park which is partly in Hungary and partly in Slovakia and which is renowned for its huge cave systems. There are many urgent conservation challenges there, particularly to protect the incredibly bio-diverse grasslands from scrub invasion due to agricultural neglect and from the pressures for agricultural intensification. Serious threats are posed by foreign agri-business and particularly recently from the drive to increase the acreage of biofuel and biomass crops.