EES working group

ECONOMICS AND ECOSYSTEM SERVICES (EES) WORKING GROUP

An alarming development affecting Eurosite’s members today concerns the funding of their activities or the increasing lack of available funds. Overall, funds in the form of subsidies are decreasing or disappearing. To protect work in nature conservation, new ways of funding must be found. The value of ecosystem services is being increasingly talked about. People, businesses and countries take all kinds of ecosystem-related ‘products’ for granted: medicines, clean air and water, CO2 storage, wind- and solar energy, and so on. Eurosite’s EES Working Group helps and supports members to take action on these issues and make ecosystem services work for them. Its goals are to:

• Increase the number of protected areas implementing ecosystem services planning;
• Increase awareness of the economic and environmental benefits of protecting and enhancing ecosystem services.

The EES Working Group, formed in 2013, meets regularly throughout the year and holds annual workshops on topics such as carbon sequestration.

Foreseen activities:

Developing an elaborated training programme on ecosystem services for site managers

Products:

The Working Group organised a “Ecosystems at your service” seminar during the Eurosite Annual Meeting in Serres, Greece, from 8 until 10 November 2016. Based on the outcomes of this seminar, a special edition of the Eurosite eNewsletter about ecosystem services was published.

• In 2017 the working group developed a leaflet on ‘ecosystem services for site managers’.
• In 2019 the working group developed a guidance document on ecosystem services and GIS.
• In 2020 the working group organised a workshop as part of the online Annual Meeting.

A special edition of the Eurosite eNewsletter was published based on the outcomes.