By Andrew Bachell, Chief Executive, John Muir Trust

AMONG 27 quotes engraved on the exterior wall of the Scottish Parliament are these from the prolific pen of John Muir : “The battle for conservation will go on endlessly. It is part of the universal battle between right and wrong.”

Today is the 180th birthday of Dunbar’s most famous son, who set sail with his family just before his 11th birthday for a new life across the Atlantic, where he became, according to his obituary in the New York Times, “one of the greatest thinkers of America”.

In his adopted homeland, those words carved on a slab of Mull granite outside Holyrood are finding new resonance. After a century of progress, Muir’s legacy is under threat. The Obama administration designated half a billion acres of land and sea for protection – more than any previous government.

But the battle for conservation is never-ending – and the current administration under President Trump is now carrying out the largest land deregulation programme in history to allow drilling, mining logging and ranching on Native American tribal lands and other areas protected for ecological diversity and cultural heritage.

Conservation of nature and culture is a progressive cause. It’s about standing up for the public interest against exploitation. It’s about safeguarding our rivers, mountains, forests, seas and wildlife for the benefit of future generations against those who seek personal and short term gain. And it’s about keeping alive historical memories of the people and communities who once lived on our landscapes.

Scotland is not the US. We don’t have vast wilderness areas where human influence is minimal. Many of our landscapes are ecologically barren and damaged by centuries of exploitation through felling, burning, draining and overgrazing.

But we do have wild, rugged terrain that sits somewhere on the spectrum between urban and wilderness areas. As the actor David Hayman pointed out in a recent BBC documentary, The Battle for Scotland’s Countryside, people spend thousands of pounds travelling halfway round the world to gaze on these magnificent landscapes.

It’s easy to take something for granted when it’s on your doorstep. Scotland’s landscape is a precious national asset, which is one reason why the John Muir Trust supported the Scottish Government’s 2014 decision to afford “significant protection” to 42 Wild Land Areas covering 20 per cent of our country. We are pleased that, so far, six out of seven proposed large-scale developments within these boundaries have been refused.

But our land has the potential to deliver so much more. With a step change in land management we could repair the damage of centuries past and start to transform the lower slopes of our uplands turn into thriving, living landscapes of trees, wildflowers, insects, birds, wild animals and livestock. And people.

There is a misconception that wild nature threatens livelihoods and has to be conquered and destroyed. That was the attitude that led to forced depopulation and left vast areas of the Highlands empty of people and with nature impoverished.

We can point to many examples in Europe where vibrant communities prosper in close proximity to large areas where wild nature has been given the space to truly flourish.

Here in Scotland, there are promising signs of change in the air. Tough questions are being asked about how our land is managed, and in whose interests. There is growing talk of repopulating and rewilding land that has been given over to grouse, sheep and deer.

Much of Scotland’s uplands are still in the same relatively unproductive state as the day John Muir left these shores. We can do better, so let’s make a start soon.