Project Manager Cultural Landscapes
“There is nothing more gorgeous than being outdoors and experiencing nature,” says Cornelia Mähr. For the native Austrian, preserving biodiversity is her vocation and an absolute matter of the heart: “If we want to exist as a species in the long run, we should strengthen nature’s diversity instead of exploiting it.”
Since 2024, the biologist brings her knowledge and passion to her position as Project Manager Cultural Landscapes at EuroNatur, drawing on a broad range of experiences – amongst others as long-standing biodiversity officer in two nature parks in southern Burgenland. There, she realised various conservation projects with limited financial means and built an impressive network including nurseries and schools. The latter were involved in maintenance work, planting campaigns and the design of theme trails. She also organised various events, the largest of them a climate conference for children and young people at which the next generations were inspired in creative ways for nature, climate and wildlife conservation.
A key moment for Cornelia at EuroNatur was her first visit to Livanjsko Polje, a vast wetland in Bosnia and Herzegovina. “I was overwhelmed by the scale of it – there is hardly anything like it left in Europe,” she remembers. The protection and sustainable development of European cultural landscapes are among her core tasks, and she puts particular importance on working together with local people: “The diversity of cultural landscapes depends on their sustainable use. You need locals as allies who are passionate about the issue – they are its propagators.”
Cornelia Mähr highly values the international work environment at EuroNatur. “Interacting with people from different cultures is a source of strength for me. It is so important not to set up projects from the outside, but to design them in tandem with our local partners. It is precisely this approach which I find so convincing about EuroNatur.” The passionate diver and equestrian follows the call of nature and the great outdoors in her private life, too. “That keeps renewing my energy for my work,” she says.