The last week of February saw seven Horizon Europe projects (CircHive, BIONEXT, BIOTRAILS, MOSAIC, TC for BE, Planet4b and SELINA) come together for the second edition of the Transformative Change webinar series. The event itself falls under the broader umbrella of the Ecosystem Services Partnership (ESP) and explores aspects, factors and trends underpinning transformative change in biodiversity conservation. This time, the topic in focus was “Methodologies for mapping systems interactions”, a key component of environmental monitoring.

Luis Inostroza began the session with an introduction of the ESP, an organisation committed to supporting the science-policy interface for biodiversity by enhancing knowledge and awareness in research and governance circles alike.

CircHive followed suit, with Ira Bhattarai of the Natural Resources Institute of Finland discussing life-cycle assessment, natural capital accounting and input-output methods in the context of biodiversity footprint evaluations.

Alexandra Ioannou of the University of Thessaly and the ATHENA Research Center represented BIONEXT. Her showcase revolved around the project’s use of the JUNIPER model for navigating the water, energy, food, transport and health nexus.

A presentation on participatory system dynamics modelling and how they could support policies in the climate-biodiversity-society nexus was given on behalf of BIOTRAILS by Raffaele Giordano from Italy’s National Research Council.

BIOTRAILS was further addressed in a section on structural equation models as tools to understand societal attitudes towards sustainable behaviour. Evangelia Drakou of the Harokopeio University of Athens unveiled the topic to attendees.

Last but not least, the Flanders Research Institute for Agriculture, Fisheries and Food’s Anna Verhoeve had the opportunity to explore the importance of policy labs to SPIs on the path towards turning science into action, a topic at the core of the MOSAIC project. 

You can find out more about EU research projects working towards transformative change in biodiversity here.