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Serbia

Serbia has 62 IPAs. 31 qualified through all three criteria, including criterion B, so indicating the presence of at least 600 native plant taxa within the IPA.

IPAs in serbia

Serbia lies in the central part of the Balkan peninsula, covering 88,361 km2, and is bordered by Hungary, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Macedonia FYR, Bulgaria and Romania. The climate is continental in the north and south east with semi-arid summer and cold winter periods, humid-temperate in the west and in the centre and east semi-arid temperate-continental or sub-continental, with transitional sub-Mediterranean parts.

Rindera umbellata - a steppic species that is rare across the whole Panonnian plain

Northern lowland Serbia consists of the south east Pannonian plain where wide alluvial lowlands and surrounding loess plateaus lie along the Danube, Sava, Tisa, Tamiš and Begej rivers. Two mountains, Fruška Gora (538m) and Vršačke planine (640m), are found here. Southern Serbia is mountainous, but contains the valleys of the Velika, Morava, Western Morava, Southern Morava, Nišava and Ibar rivers. The mountains belong to four systems: Dinaric Alps, Carpathian-Balkan mountains, the Rhodopes and Scardo-Pindhic. In the east old ignaceous rocks and limestone and siliceous bedrocks support croplands with some steppe and sand-steppe vegetation and remnants of diverse continental sand-loving vegetation. West and central Serbia is formed of limestone, serpentine and ignaceous rocks.

Along the main rivers, alluvial forests of white willow, white and black poplar, ash and pedunculate oak occur, as well as small areas of marshes with rich aquatic flora. The mountainous regions of Serbia are covered by mixed oak forests, mostly of Hungarian-Turkish oak and sessile oak-hornbeam communities. The vegetation belts above these are beech or beech-silver fir. Sub-alpine forest is either spruce in the continental mountains and Macedonian or white-barked pine in the mountains of Kosovo and Metochia province. The limestone and serpentine gorges and canyons support a very rich flora including endemic species. Mountain areas above the tree line are also rich in diverse crevice, scree and rocky ground communities composed of endemic and alpine and sub-alpine species.

Serbia has 62 IPAs. 31 qualified through all three criteria, indicating the presence of at least 600 native plants. Approximately 40% of the total IPA area is covered by forest (mostly broadleaved) and semi-natural grassland habitats cover almost 30%. 56% of Serbian IPAs are nationally protected in full or in part - nearly half at a higher level of protection. The most frequent threats to them are land abandonment, fragmentation and invasive species, although the most acute threats come from deforestation and water extraction.

Coordinating organisation:

Ministry of Environmental Protection of the Republic of Serbia

Contact:

Vladimir Stevanović