The 6th edition of the Ecosystem Services Partnership Europe Conference was held from the 18th until the 22nd of May in Prague, Czechia, with scientists, policymakers, practitioners and other stakeholders. Attendees explored how ecosystem services can be harnessed to reduce social inequality and strengthen climate resilience, as well as drive sustainable development. The conference program was structured to provide a comprehensive and well-balanced combination of various plenary sessions, parallel sessions, and networking opportunities.
On 20th of May, consortium members took the stage to contribute to the European ecosystem agenda with several oral presentations. Project coordinator and CEO of Ecostack Innovations, Prof. Dr. Mario Balzan, contributed to the session “Islands at the forefront of the sustainable and inclusive ecosystem services approach,” examining governance and knowledge gaps in pollinator ecosystem services on small islands, using Malta as a case study. Prof. Dr. Aristides Moustakas, a research scientist from the University of Crete, contributed to the same session, delivering another presentation on how stakeholders across 21 European islands perceive the land use-climate change-biodiversity nexus. The day finished with Dr. Christos Zoumides, representative of the Cyprus Institute, presenting during the session “How do food and landscape co-create ecosystem services?” In his presentation, he focused on the idea of co-creating value in mountain agriculture through a voluntary quality label in the Troodos Mountains in Cyprus.
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On the following day, Prof. Dr. Stoyan Nedkov from the Bulgarian National Institute of Geophysics, Geodesy and Geography delivered a presentation during another meaningful session, “Are we there yet? Enhancing implementation of the ecosystem services framework with science-policy-practice interfaces and national networks.” During his talk, Nedkov focused on the journey of the Bulgarian ESP National Network since its establishment in 2014, emphasising the work done by the Community-Driven Biodiversity Knowledge Hub developed within the Green Talent Project, which is a cross-project initiative inspired by the Community of Practice established under the SELINA project.
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At the event, Green Talent was also represented at Pensoft Publishers’ booth with project materials, alongside other fellow projects, such as BioAgora, SELINA and CO-OP4CBD. We are extremely proud of our consortium’s work represented on such an international stage.
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