News
We are happy to have hosted a session on ‘Ecosystem services indicators in the era of big, coarse data‘ during the ESP Europe conference (June 2021). In the age of big data, especially in Europe, we have to ask ourselves: which of those data can be relevant for large-scale assessments and monitoring of ecosystem services, natural capital and nature-based solutions (e.g. MAES, IPBES, SEEA EEA, GEOBON). What are the key data sources, and what does it require for them to be useful for research, policy and management at multiple scales? Which indicators can be underpinned by these data sources? According to many, it is ‘time to deliver’, the era of bringing biodiversity, ecosystem services and their values to the fore. If we are to make our research speak to decision makers, it also means that we have to make numbers speak. The book of abstracts will be available later.
A collaborative viewpoint paper on ES indicators has been published in Ecological Indicators. Feel free to read this open access paper here. This paper is the result of a highly successful and interactive double session during the European ES Conference in Antwerp (2016). The session featured well-prepared and well-structured presentations and a vivid discussion of 45 minutes at the end. Thanks to the presentations as well as additional information provided by the presenters, we have been able to write this viewpoint paper, lead by Alexander van Oudenhoven. It features personal findings from researchers involved in 7 case studies, as well as key findings from the literature on ecosystem service indicator selection criteria.
ESP Conference Outputs
- Session during 2022 European ESP Conference: The operationalization of ecosystem services indicators: a matter of scale, data, purpose and end-users Book of abstracts, Presentations, Recordings
- Session during 2022 European ESP Conference: Ecological tipping points and societal transformation processes in social-ecological systems Book of abstracts, Recordings
- Session during 2021 European ESP Conference: Ecosystem services indicators in the era of big, coarse data. Recording of session, Book of abstracts
- Session during 2019 ESP10 world Conference: Science meeting reality: developing fit-for-purpose ecosystem services indicators. Book of abstracts
- Session during 2018 Latin America ESP conference: From data repositories to ecosystem services assessments – mind the gap. Book of Abstracts, Presentations
- Session during 2018 European ESP conference: Ecosystem service Indicators to assess social-ecological systems. Book of abstracts, Presentations
- Viewpoint paper in Ecological Indicators (open access, published 2018) based on the 2016 European ESP conference. Free download here.
- Session during 2016 European ESP conference: Ecosystem service indicators: what you measure is what you get? Book of abstracts, Presentations
- Session during 2015 8th ESP World conference: Essential Ecosystem Variables Book of abstracts, Presentations
Envisioned activities and outputs
Why do we need a working group and what do we see as a working group? This group has always had a long list of interested people, but we think constituting a working group should go beyond e-mails sent by a few individuals. We envision active collaboration, both during and outside of ESP conferences, for instance through:
- Organising workshop sessions with equal time for presentations and discussion / co-writing / sharing.
- Writing reflection / position papers or commentaries.
- Organising workshops and seminars outside ESP conferences on specific topics (e.g. criteria, NEAs, specific geographical regions)
- Writing research proposals together
- Conducting structured, combined reviews and/or meta-analyses on above-mentioned questions, especially on ‘What are we really measuring?’
- Sharing knowledge – providing overviews of recent and key publications and project outputs or initiatives with strong focus on indicators
- Sharing TWG3 news through a list server that has been set up in 2016, and allows anybody to chip in