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Building synergies between OpenNESS cases & building bridges with other projects
Over 35 OpenNESS partners representing 22 case studies met in Edinburgh 17-18th November 2014. The goals of the meeting were to agree the roadmap going forward, to discuss the format of deliverables, to stimulate interaction between case studies, and to operationalize joint research activities (i.e. research where case studies join up their research). Such joint research activities include multifunctional forest management, ecosystem services in urban areas, integrated river basin management, mountain ecosystems, conflicts mediation within protected areas, tools for ecosystem services trade-offs, transdisciplinarity, and participatory social and ecological indicators for monitoring and integrating government and community institutions.
A template for the next major report of all 27 case studies was discussed and feedback was collected from all present. A strategy for the important final deliverable of this case studies work package was discussed. This concerns a ‘Review paper reporting the assessment by the case study representatives and the case advisory boards of the practical advantages and limitations of ecosystem services and natural capital assessment from the practitioners’ perspective’. The stimulating sessions highlighted the breadth of research conducted on ecosystem services in the project. Meriwether Wilson of the OPERAs sister project gave an insightful summary of work conducted across their 12 case studies (called ‘exemplars’) and joined the company for dinner on Tuesday night along with Mark Rounsevell, the OPERAs coordinator. Four representatives of the Greensurge project also joined the company and enjoyed stimulating discussions on urban ecosystem service research.
Photo: WP5 community in Edinburgh © Francis Turkelboom