BAPs were designed to take action to reduce the risk of mass extinctions of animal and plant species.

This was reported to be among the most serious environmental issues that we would expect to face over the next century.

Unusually, a more holistic approach was taken to dealing with the subject.

Rather than just a focus on individual species, BAPs also deal with habitats as these are also often under threat.

The United Kingdom BAP has been in place since 1997 and the latest edition was published last year.

This focuses attention not just on the habitats of the land area of the UK but also offshore waters and individual species.

In all, there are 1,149 species and 65 different types of habitat identified within the BAP and for each of these there is a management plan put in place to improve the position.

Species such as hedgehogs, house sparrows, grass snakes, bottlenose dolphins, red squirrels and garden tiger moths are among those deemed to be under threat from various factors including habitat loss and threat from human activity.

Looking through the BAP, the most striking part is the section dealing with habitats.

Sometimes we take for granted the sheer number of different types of habitat to be found on our shores.

Just looking at a sample of the range of habitats under the microscope demonstrates the wide range of different types of environment that are under threat.

Some are easily identifiable such as coastal sand dunes, mudflats, woodlands and heathlands but there are others that I had never heard of such as machair (a type of coastal grassland found especially in north and west Scotland) maerl beds (formed from a specific type of seaweed) and modiolus modiolos beds (formed from a species of mussel).

The amount of work that has gone into each of the habitat action plans is staggering.

All of the plans outline the current position, identify the factors that may be affecting the health of the habitat, link to other similar habitats, outline the types of action that may be required and identify the management issues that need to be addressed (including legal status, further research etc).

Surfing the UK BAP website could take days in itself, but when you consider that this work has also been replicated in other countries of the world (189 countries signed up to the Convention on Biological Diversity that introduced the concept of BAPs), you then realise how much progress has been made in the 15 years since Rio.

If you are interested in the UK BAP, take a look at the website at www.ukbap.org.uk.

Give yourself plenty of time!