England should soon be able to boast its first natural World Heritage site - a 95-mile stretch of fossil-rich coastline between Studland Bay in Dorset and Exmouth in Devon.

The Unesco World Heritage Committee meets in Helsinki this month to decide whether a bid by Dorset and Devon County Council (DDCC) and the Dorset Coast Forum to award the coast World Heritage status is successful.

If the bid is won, it will mark the beginning of a new era of responsibility for DDCC, who will be charged with looking after the coast forever.

A spokesperson for DDCC said the challenge would be to make a real difference to out of season tourism: The team is already looking hard at using places in the hinterland as 'gateway towns' - from which tourists can explore the coast. As an educational resource, attracting schools and researchers on location, the coast is considered unique; its fossils contain unbroken evidence of more than 180 million years of evolution.