TWO members of staff at the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority (YDNPA) will be passing on their expertise next week as they join a team of volunteers working in Eastern Europe.

Ranger Services Manager Alan Hulme and Access Ranger Paul Sheehan will be heading off on Saturday (July 12) to the Balkans Peace Park’s first summer programme in a remote village in the Accursed Mountains of Northern Albania.

They will spend a week there staging practical workshops and discussing the creation of a possible longer-term collaboration between the YDNPA and the Peace Park. They also plan to take part in a trek from the neighbouring Valbona Valley to Thethi.

Alan said: “We hope to be able to pass on some of the experience we have collected from living and working in a national park.

“We will be looking at the way the park is run and at some of the practical issues that arise and we will be suggesting possible solutions.”

The Balkans Peace Park Project (BPPP) is a UK charity that has been working in the mountainous area where the common borders of Albania, Montenegro and Kosovo meet. It aims to protect the ecology and heritage of the mountain landscapes from uncontrolled exploitation, while promoting ethical and sustainable tourism, enabling the ancient village communities to survive.

Antonia Young, from Hetton, near Skipton, speaking on behalf of the BPPP, said: “We are delighted Alan and Paul will be taking part in the summer programme. The Balkans Peace Park is an area of wild mountain beauty – one of the most important biodiversity areas for both the Balkans and Europe with an incredibly rich cultural and historic heritage.

“It is also an area that continues to suffer economic and environmental decline, as well as the ethnic tensions that have blighted the Balkans.”

More information about the Peace Park is available at www.balkanspeacepark.org.