A RETIRING national park boss has outlined major challenges facing the protected area and its communities, saying post-Covid conflicts created by some visitors could be turned to an advantage, bird of prey persecution must be halted and better connectivity is vital if the exodus of young people is to be reversed.

Andy Wilson, who will leave the North York Moors National Park Authority next month after 20 years as its chief executive, said it remains unclear how quickly the rural economy would be able to recover from the pandemic following numerous businesses going bust and huge numbers of others facing heavy pressure.

He said while the authority and other organisations were working to make recovery as swift and full as possible, a range of other issues were facing the area as a result of the outbreak, including unemployment, and poor prospects for young people leaving colleges.

The Northern Echo: Andy WilsonAndy Wilson

Mr Wilson said: “We need to make sure rural areas are sufficiently recognised in the plans for economic recovery.”

Just a year after taking responsibility for the 1,436sq km area, he faced some similar issues with the foot and mouth epidemic. He said: “That affected a lot of people very personally as well as well as having a huge effect on farming and the tourist economy because the whole place was shut down. It was devastating for individuals. My father-in-law had his herd of milking cows slaughtered. However, in terms of working life across Yorkshire most people continued going to work as normal and there was little impact on most people’s social lives. At the time we all thought it was an enormous event, which it was but, goodness me, Covid is a much bigger upheaval. Covid has impacted on everyone.”

Mr Wilson was hailed as “visionary” when he was appointed, following pioneering farming and conservation schemes in Northumberland, and two decades later he said he remained deeply concerned over the sharp decline in stewardship schemes which recognised the role farmers played in keeping the parks rich in wildlife and compensated them for lost income.

He said: “It has been really hard for the farming families and some of the farmers have been forced to undo the environmental work that between us and them we have carried out over the past 20 years simply to carry on a living.”

Mr Wilson said while the gap between EU-run schemes finishing and new programmes being launched needed to be recognised, the authority would continue to work to support communities and attract more young people to live in the park through its award-winning apprenticeship initiatives and efforts to increase affordable housing.

He said to attract young people rapid action was needed to address rural broadband and mobile phone connectivity, which had led to a loss of both private businesses and public services.

He said: “Pubs have closed, phone boxes and bus services have gone, post offices have closed. The quid pro quo should have been the effective provision of broadband and mobile phone coverage.

“One of the big failures of the last 20 years is that there wasn’t an understanding that the key issue had become the need for a universal provision of those services.

“I am not denying that things have got better, but there is still a huge lag behind.”

Mr Wilson said another area of frustration was the continuing persecution of birds of prey. Just two weeks ago five buzzards were found killed near Bransdale.

When asked if the apparent conflict between the game shooting industry and birds of prey could be overcome, Mr Wilson said: “I think it is solvable and I think it is straightforward. People need to stop acting illegally. For the long-term future of those industries they need to stop doing that. Ultimately, the public won’t tolerate people breaking the law in this way. Either the industry reforms itself or eventually parliament will legislate. The Moorland Association, the leadership of the industry, is absolutely clear - there needs to be change.”

He said another area of conflict in the park, involving some younger and first-time visitors in recent weeks, was “a problem that we will turn into an opportunity”.

“The job of educating the public what they need to be doing is manageable and we are already changing the way we work to talk directly to those people when they visit the park.”

He said a much more tough issue to tackle would be climate change, which had become the biggest single threat to the national park.

Mr Wilson said: “It’s already influencing the park hugely. We have a deadly mixture of species that are coming into the country due to globalisation and at the same time we have got global warming.

“A hard winter that might have killed off these new arrivals doesn’t happen any more. There is a terrible conflict going on, you can see it in the tree species.

“Elms had been devastated, while alder, ash and oak. The impact on nature is ferocious.”

He said in retirement he was looking forward to cycling around the park and viewing its landscapes and nature without his work hat on, but added he would miss the spectrum of people he had worked with to shape the area.

He added: “I like to think of the national park and everything we do as one big family and it’s a fantastic family to work with.”