October was a momentously important month for the National Ecosystem Assessment (NEA) Initiative: after three long years, the NEA Initiative and its consortium and country partners were finally able to meet back in-person on the occasion of the NEA Initiative Global Workshop 2022.
Hosted in Cambridge, United Kingdom, the NEA Initiative Global Workshop was held from the 24th to the 28th of October and delivered in partnership with UNDP and UNESCO under the umbrella of the Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services Network (BES-Net) in a hybrid format. The team behind UNEP-WCMC’s NEA Initiative was delighted to welcome 50 participants, including 8 country teams (Botswana, Malawi, Thailand, the Dominican Republic, Cambodia, Grenada, Azerbaijan, and Bosnia and Herzegovina), as well as international experts and practitioners such as Tranche I countries representatives (Colombia, Cameroon, and Vietnam).
The event was principally aimed at providing Tranche II and Tranche III countries with a greater understanding of key concepts within the evaluation and use of the assessment findings stages of the assessment process. Over five days, through a rich agenda filled with technical sessions and peer-to-peer learning, the workshop contributed to identifying and facilitating support for capacity development, as well as to deliver updates on project progress and lessons learned. It also created a space to facilitate networking opportunities and reinforce global communities of practice around ecosystem assessments. From stakeholder engagement to community participatory mapping and engaging the private sector in the assessment process, numerous topics were addressed, with a continuous effort to promote gender balance and engage with indigenous people and local communities.
The NEA Initiative Global Workshop 2022 was a great opportunity to exchange experiences in implementing and innovating national ecosystem assessments, and a chance for the NEA Initiative to receive feedback to strengthen its support. The workshop was marked by a strong spirit of knowledge exchange and collaboration, with country teams reaffirming their commitments to assess the status and drivers of change to biodiversity and to transform policies to account for people and nature.
“The NEA Initiative Global Workshop 2022 demonstrated the commitment, leadership and valuable contributions of this network of scientists and practitioners, who are part of the national assessments and provide relevant, available and reliable information for decision-making and the conservation and sustainable use of biological diversity and ecosystem services around the world. The need to close the gap between science, policy, and practice is more evident than ever if we hope to address the current global environmental challenges humanity is facing. National ecosystem assessments are a living process and not static documents. Further exchange of lessons learned, knowledge and strengthening the network of practice were agreed as a step forward.“
Juanita Chaves, Head of the NEA Initiative team
All resources that are relevant to the workshop, including presentations and recordings, are available on the NEA Initiative website, here.
We would like to thank our consortium partners and donors without whom this event would not have been possible.
The National Ecosystem Assessment Initiative (NEA Initiative) at UNEP-WCMC is part of the Biodiversity & Ecosystem Services Network (BES-Net), working in partnership with UNDP and UNESCO. Financial support for the NEA Initiative is being provided by the International Climate Initiative (IKI) of the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Nuclear Safety, and Consumer Protection of the Federal Republic of Germany, the Norwegian Environmental Agency, the Japan Biodiversity Fund, and SwedBio.