<p>The Kingdom of the Netherlands also includes six Caribbean islands. The islands of Saba, Sint Eustatius and Bonaire are special municipalities and together form the Caribbean Netherlands, while the islands of Sint Maarten, Aruba and Curaçao are constituent countries. The implementation of the first Caribbean Netherlands Nature Policy Plan 2013–2017 is still being evaluated, while no national targets have been adopted for the other islands. The information on the Caribbean will therefore be provided in the section on the Aichi Targets. The national targets in the first four sections are for the European Netherlands. The Netherlands has committed itself to nature objectives stated in the EU Biodiversity Strategy and thus indirectly to those in the Convention on Biological Diversity. The national targets are based on the European targets and related to the Aichi Biodiversity Targets.The EU has directives to ensure that species native to the EU and the habitats they depend on are protected. The Birds and Habitats Directives are crucial for preventing further loss of biodiversity and eventually fully restoring European biodiversity. The Directives are fully implemented in Dutch legislation (Nature Conservation Act), but ‘reaching a favourable conservation status of all habitat types and species of European importance and adequate populations of naturally occurring wild bird species’ (EU Biodiversity Strategy) is still a long way off. For habitats in water bodies, the EU Water Framework Directive is an important policy instrument for achieving good qualitative and quantitative status of these water bodies. The aim of this Directive is a 'good status' for all ground and surface waters (rivers, lakes, transitional waters and coastal waters) in the EU.The relevant conventions, directives and agreements have been implemented in national policy and legislation, including the policy documents Natural Capital Agenda (NCA, 2013) and the national nature vision The Natural Way Forward – Government Vision 2014 (NV), and since the decentralisation of nature policy in the provincial Nature Visions (PVs) and in the Nature Pact (NP, 2013), the agreement between the Dutch government and the provinces on the implementation of Dutch nature policy. In these NBSAP’s the following objectives are related to the first main target “By 2020, the assessments of species and habitats protected by EU nature law show better conservation or a secure status in Europe for 100 % more habitats and 50 % more species” of the European biodiversity strategy (‘protect species and habitats’):o&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;protect and improve the conservation status of species (NV, NP, PVs);o&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;improve environmental conditions in pursuit of the goals set by the Birds and Habitats Directives (NV, NP, PVs);o&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;improve spatial conditions by creating a robust national ecological network (NV, NP, PVs);o&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;effective regulation to protect nature and reduce burden on business and the public (NV, PVs);o&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;build an open, learning knowledge network: know more together; knowledge sharing to increase awareness, public support and participation (NV, NCA, PVs).</p>