A strategy for the long-term conservation of Britain's threatened wild plants and animals and the habitats that sustain them is outlined in the Biodiversity Action Plan.
A task force will publish programmes next year for preserving and restoring species and habitats. Targets will be set for 2000 and 2010.
The strategy says top priority should be given to conserving British plants and animals that are globally threatened or which are unique to Britain. It calls for protection plans to be put into effect "for at least 90 per cent of the presently known globally threatened and threatened endemic species within the next 10 years".
Some 6,600 animals are classified as globally threatened. Twenty-four of these are in Britain, including the European otter, three birds (the red kite, the corncrake and the white-tailed eagle) and a range of freshwater fish, beetles, snails and dragonflies. Britain also has more than 60 species of plants that occur nowhere else.
Another conservation target will be species that occur in globally significant proportions in Britain, which is home to half the world's grey seals, 60 per cent of gannets, 30 per cent of bluebells and 25 per cent of fungi.
Although the plan commits the Government to conserve and restore hedgerows, there is no mention of an earlier government promise to introduce legislation that would prevent farmers digging up hedges without authorisation.
The Government intends to return the nation's emissions of carbon dioxide, the gas linked with global warming, to 1990 levels by 2000 through a mixture of taxes and energy efficiency schemes, most already announced.
This would be enough to meet Britain's commitments under the Climate Change Convention. But environmentalists had hoped the Government would announce cuts beyond the end of the century.
Measures include VAT on domestic fuel bills and a revision of the building regulations to strengthen energy efficiency. Transport is expected to cut its emissions by 2.5 million tonnes through increases in fuel taxes.
The document expects the population of Britain to grow more slowly in coming decades and stabilise at about 62 million by 2030. The number of households will grow by 14 per cent to 26 million by 2012 because more people are choosing to live in smaller groups or separately. This will reinforce the need for more efficient use of natural resources and more recycling.
