The Dutch Minister of Agriculture, Nature Management and Food Quality should not have issued a licence to companies that wanted to introduce Irish mussels and oysters in the Oosterschelde, a protected nature area. It was not demonstrated that this would not have significant effects on a protected nature area. The Minister should have made the plans/projects subject to appropriate assessments of their implications for the site in view of the site’s conservation objectives, in line with the explanations given to the Habitats directive in ECJ Case C-127/02.