MAESAll Pilots Workshop
4 June 2013, 09:30 – 17:00
EC Building, rue Guimard 10, 1040 Brussels, Groundfloor, room 2
Draft Minutes
Participants (see Annex)
1) Current State of Progress for the different Pilots (see updated information fiche for each of the six pilots)
Each Pilot Co-Lead gave a short update on progress made so far.
- Pilot 1: Methodology will be tested with real data by some participants (i.e. LT, HU, Ceeweb); coherence between work of Pilot 1 and the 4 ecosystem Pilots needs to be ensured; relevant work from EEA (see updated list) and JRC needs to be taken on board;
- Pilot 2: Table is being completed at EU and national level with a view to summarize preliminary material by July; important aspects to be taken into account are the semi-natural vegetation and balance between provisioning, regulating and cultural services; Austria will do some work in relation to Art. 17; Potential use of specific data from IACS will also be investigated (cf. BG, CZ);
- Pilot 3: Table filled in at EU level will be posted on circa; biodiversity and ecosystem status have been explicitly included; Forest classification is based on EEA 2006; MS will provide feedback by end June; how to transform data into indicators remains an issue (cf. Forest condition data);
- Pilot 4: JRC is working on a typology for freshwater ecosystems that will be completed this week; remaining issues include habitats associated to different freshwater ecosystems, alignment with WFD, CICES for abiotic services; an updated table will be shared with group by mid-June; FR will test table on wetlands;
- Pilot 5: work is expected to benefit from MAES marine workshop on 19 June; EEA is working on a cross-walk on marine ecosystem typology; JRC is filling in the Table at EU level; CICES classification will need to be adapted for marine; FR and PT will provide case-studies on coastal lagoons and coral reefs; JRC literature review on marine ecosystem services will be used for selecting indicators;
- Pilot 6: an outline of a project plan has been prepared; work is being supported by EEA consultants; a workshop will be organized by EEA on 27-28 June looking at concepts and approaches; ENV has published a report on valuation methods; a remaining issue is the importance of valuation versus accounting;
2) Work being carried out by EEA and its associated ETCs (see summary document prepared by EEA)
Markus Erhard presented the work being undertaken by EEA and associated ETCs that would be relevant for the MAES Pilots.
Action:EEA will provide more detailed information concerning the ongoing work. This would allow those involved with the MAES activities to take full-account of EEA initiatives when planning their work. If needed, a workshop might be organized in autumn to do the work and discuss synergies and common issues (e.g. link between ecosystems and ecosystem services, bridges between EU and MS typologies, possible refinement of EEA biophysical mapping as done by JRC on urban).
3) Work being undertaken in the context of the MESEU support contract
Leon Braat presented the most relevant outcomes of the MESEU contract for the Pilot work. It has been summarized in different tables listing country case-studies versus Pilot ecosystems, and country case-studies versus ecosystem services and indicators and associated fact sheets.
A step-by-step approach for guiding countries undertaking MAES was well received and considered as a pragmatic way forward even if it implies a lot of awareness-raising and capacity-building work to be carried out.
Action: The interim report when revised will be made available to all.
4) Review of the Aim, Scope, Deliverables and Timing for the Thematic Pilots
By the end of the year, the MAES thematic pilots will provide recommendations and guidelines to help Member States carry out the mapping and assessment of ecosystems and ecosystem services as foreseen under Action 5 of the Biodiversity strategy. The nature, and form in which these recommendations and guidelines should be delivered as well as the process, including timetable and milestones, by which they will be developed, finalized and approved, were briefly discussed:
- There will be several kinds of output including the outputs from the MAES thematic pilots that will be discussed in the MAES working group and the CGBN, technical reports and documents produced by EEA and associated ETCs, reports and data-bases produced through the MESEU contract and ad-hoc documents, summary/overview documents produced by Cion or EEA
- .The output from the various on-going actions should be held/hosted on one site to make access for Member States and stakeholders easier;
- While these outputs would be useful for Member States the uptake and capacity building would be more effective if there was a pro-active follow-up perhaps involving focused workshops bringing together mapping and assessment experts from one or Member States to carry out "hands –on" mapping and assessment work (possibilities/modalities to be decided).
The expected outputs from the different processes form a package that needs to be put together in a coherent way.
Action: EEA and JRC will liaise on the MAES matrix to ensure common understanding on the overlay between ecosystems and ecosystem services.DG ENV will draft a roadmap with expected outcomes by the end of 2013, 2014 and beyond that will be shared with Pilots in view of MAES WG of September.
5) Cross-cutting Technical Issues
The workshop focused mainly on the 4 ecosystem Pilots and relationship with Pilot 1. The link between Pilot 6 and the other Pilots is not totally clear and will need to be addressed at a next meeting. Other inter-related issues (e.g. interactions between ecosystems, trade-offs between services, multiple services from one ecosystem/different services from the same ecosystem dependent upon location, soils, etc.) will be discussed bilaterally and included in the guidance documentations whenever possible.
Action: Work on cross-cutting issues will need to be done after the September MAES WG and before December when finalizing the deliverables of the Pilots.
All supporting documents including EEA-ETC/SIA report on data for mapping and assessing ecosystem assessment are available on circa in The 'Pilot Horizontal support' folder:
Annex: List of Participants
MAES All Pilots Workshop, Brussels, 04 June 2013
2
1) Member States' Co-Leads:
Member State / Last Name / First Name / Email / Pilot / PresenceLithuania / NARUSEVICIUS / Vytautas / / 1 / Excused
Belgium / VERBOVEN / Jan / / 2 /
Portugal / MARTA-PEDROSO / Cristina / / 3 /
Sweden / BENGTSSON / Jan / / 3 /
France / DEGEORGES / Patrick / / 4 + 5 /
FIORINA / Christel / / 4+5 / Excused
BEAUFARON / Guéhanne / / 4+5 /
Bulgaria / GOCHEVA / Kremena / / 6 /
2) EU Co-Leads:
EU / Last Name / First Name / Email / Pilot / PresenceENV.B2 / MURPHY / Patrick / / 1 /
JRC IES.H04 / PARACCHINI / Maria-Luisa / / 2 /
JRC IES-H03 / BARREDO / José / / 3 /
JRC IES-H01 / CARDOSO / Ana Cristina / / 4 /
JRC IES-H01 / SOMMA / Francesca / / 5 /
EEA – IEA1 / PETERSEN / Jan-Erik / / 6 /
3) EU institutions:
EU / Last Name / First Name / Email / Pilot / PresenceJRC.H.08 / MAES / Joachim / / 1 /
JRC.H01 / EGOH / Benis / / 4 /
JRC.H01 / PIRODDI / Chiara / / 5 /
ENV.B2 / TELLER / Anne / / 2, 3
(all) /
ENV.B2 / DE LA FUENTE / Jesus / / 3 /
ENV.B2 / FRITZ / Marco / / 4 /
ENV.B2 / MAIER / Leo / / 5 /
ENV.B2 / CHRISTOV / Strahil / / 6 /
ENV.B2 / VERCILLO / Elena / / 5 /
EEA / ERHARD / Markus / / (all) /
4) Contractant:
ALTERRA / BRAAT / Leon / / (all) / 1