Welcome to the official webpage of the Germany ESP national network (ESP-DE). If you would like to visit this network’s discussion board, please click here (members only).
Lead team
- Bettina Matzdorf, Leibniz-Center for Agricultural Landscape Research(ZALF) and Leibniz University of Hannover
- Benjamin Burkhard, Institute for Physical Geography and Landscape Ecology, Leibniz University Hannover, Germany
- Matthias Schröter, UFZ – Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, Leipzig
If you are interested in becoming a member of the lead team, please contact the current lead team members.
If you are interested in becoming a member of this national network, please click here.
Introduction & Objectives
ESP National Networks aim to improve decision making on ecosystem services by providing a platform for researchers, government, non-government, business, industry and communities to exchange information and experiences on the theoretical and practical application of ecosystem services at local to national scales.
The concept of ecosystem services has made its way into societal, scientific and political debates over the course of the last couple of years. Large-scale studies like the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment or TEEB (i.e. Natural Capital Germany – TEEB-DE) have taken up this concept and, quite successfully, introduced it to the political arena. Nevertheless, there remains some ground to be covered in its practical application for example in the agrarian and forest industries, where the ecosystem service approach finds itself in its early stages.
ESP-DE wants to be an active, developing platform integrating different ES-related activities from science, policy and practice and projects such as the Natural Capital Germany – TEEB-DE and the European MAES initiative. Furthermore, we want to make the German ES research more visible, and we want to bundle activities to be better prepared for dissemination of our results specifically into policy and practice. Click here to read more.
More information
For more information about this working group click on one of the following links: