The environmental impacts of cities have led to a number of policy decisions, such as the inclusion of urban areas in the IPCC considerations of climate impacts or the recognition of the role of cities in national biodiversity protection strategies by the CBD COP 9 in 2008. The establishment of the European Green Capital award in 2006 provides an example of promoting good practice in the area of urban ecosystem services management.

Attempts have been made to highlight the value of urban ecosystem services, especially with reference to urban greenery, water and allotment gardens. Different perspectives on the value of urban ecosystem services have been revealed, including economic (benefits and savings), socio-ecological (resilience), psychological (well-being), cultural (e.g. inspiration), and philosophical or ethical. On the one hand, such a multitude of perspectives appeals to different groups of addressees. On the other hand, ultimately, it weakens the message delivered to decision makers who often only follow the narrowly understood economic reasoning. The objective of this seminar is to bring together the various perspectives on the value of urban ecosystem services and discuss the potential of merging and synthesizing these perspectives. Ultimately, this should lay foundations for a more sustainable management of ecosystem services in urban areas.

Objectives

• To exchange information and ideas, based on the presentation of the cutting-edge research on the different perspectives on the value of ecosystem services in urban areas.
• To discuss the potential joint research project with case studies in various European and non-European countries.
• To prepare a special issue of an international journal, based on seminar contributions. Landscape and Urban Planning will be the first one approached with a proposal.
• To support the Challenges of Sustainable Development international summer academy, the participants of which will be invited to take part in the seminar.

Conference topics

• Value of ecosystem services in urban areas.
• Social networks and ecosystem services in urban areas.
• Institutional frameworks for the management of ecosystem services in urban areas.
• Ecosystem services in urban areas as a source of inspiration.
• Interdisciplinary approaches to studying ecosystem services in urban areas.

Benefits of attending

• Getting an overview of the current research in the value of urban ecosystem services.
• Publication in a special issue of an international journal.
• Opportunity to initiate and take part in an international research project on the subject.

Participation fee

The seminar will be funded with grants managed by the Sendzimir Foundation. However, a fee of 50€ will be collected to cover some expenses for which grant money is not available. A limited number of fee waivers and accommodation subsidies will be available for participants in financial hardship. Fee deadline: 15 June 2011.

Fee includes: lunches, coffee and tea during brakes, extra activities (trip).

Fee does not include: accommodation, breakfasts. A list of suggested hotels will be provided at a later notice.

Email submission

Email (Jakub Kronenberg): [email protected]

Please submit your abstract with Ecosystem Services in Cities in the subject line. Include your name and contact details.

Deadlines

31 March 2011 abstract submissions (300 words)

15 June 2011 full paper submissions

Journal submission

Participants of the seminar will be invited to submit an expanded version of their paper for publication in a special issue of an international journal. Details of the journal will be provided at a later notice.

Whether you have been involved in the earlier discipline-based/interdisciplinary workshops or not, you are welcome to come to hear about progress in shaping the work streams and take part in discussions to influence the likely content of the calls for proposals for research funds.  

Participation will also offer you the opportunity of meeting others interested in specific issues and joining putative trans-disciplinary research teams which will bid for funds.

The meeting will take place at the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA), 66 Portland Place, London W1B 1AD.

Please note that registration does not guarantee you a place at the meeting. We will confirm places between the 14th and 16th June 2011.

date: 5 May 2011  
location: Panama City (Panama), Panama  
contact: CBD Secretariat  
phone: +1-514-288-2220  
fax: +1-514-288-6588  
e-mail: [email protected]
www: http://www.cbd.int/doc/?meeting=RWBF-06

The Everglades Foundation, the Conservancy of Southwest Florida and

Hodges University will co-host a panel discussion called “What’s the Everglades Worth to You?” to highlight the financial value of restoring America’s Everglades ecosystem. The event, which is open to the public (by reservation), will be held Tuesday, May 3, 2011, from 4:30 p.m. to 6 p.m. at Hodges University in Naples.

Mather Economics Principal Investigator Bobby McCormick, Ph.D., will present results of his firm’s research, which projects that restoration will generate $4 in economic benefits for every one dollar invested in restoration projects. In addition, an increase in economic benefits of approximately $46.5 billion ranging up to $123.9 billion could be realized based on an investment of $11.5 billion.

Additional speakers will include:

Jack Wert, executive director of the Tourism Development Council of Collier County; Matthew Raffenberg, manager of environmental licensing for Florida Power & Light; and moderator Andrew D.W. Hill, CFA of Andrew Hill Investment Advisors, Inc., and board vice-chairman for the Conservancy of Southwest Florida.

“We invite the community to this panel discussion to hear a business-to-business message regarding the value of restoring the Everglades,” said Hill. “Business audiences and the general public have much to gain from a frank discussion about job creation and economic data on water supply, tourism, fishing and real estate values associated with the Everglades ecosystem. This is a perspective that complements the intrinsic value of Everglades’ alligators, birds, fish and mangroves.”

Hodges University is located at 2655 Northbrooke Drive in Naples; to RSVP, please call Dannean Altman at (239) 250-2148 or email [email protected].

Explore, Learn & Network at the only National conference on mitigation, conservation and ecosystem markets.   This is THE conference for you if you are involved in – or have an interest in – mitigation, conservation and ecosystem banking and the related emerging markets.

Biodiversity loss and climate change are among the most pressing challenges
of our times, and are strongly interconnected. Not only will climate change
directly affect biodiversity but mitigation and adaptation measures taken by
society could also have significant effects, both positive and negative, on
biodiversity.

Conservation strategies will need to be adapted to cope with a changing
climate; there is a need to explore how this should be done, and share
experiences of putting adaptation principles into practice. There is also
growing awareness that addressing biodiversity loss and climate change in an
integrated manner can have a range of multiple benefits for society, including
synergies with sustainable development goals. However, considerable
uncertainties remain surrounding the two-way interactions of biodiversity and
climate change and good practice examples of ecosystem-based approaches
to mitigation and adaptation are still rare.

Against this background, the conference sets out to meet a growing demand
for sharing knowledge and experiences in the field of biodiversity and climate
change in Europe. Taking a transdisciplinary perspective, the aim of the
conference is to bring scientists, conservation practitioners and policymakers
together in order to improve both the integration of research outputs into
practical conservation projects, and the identification of further research
needs.

There is growing recognition amongst companies of the need to better understand and integrate the management of environmental risks and opportunities into all aspects of business operations. It is also clear that humanity’s impacts on and dependency of biodiversity and ecosystem services (BES) represent risks and opportunities for financial institutions (FIs) and their clients. Increasingly, members of the finance community are also responding to this increased recognition for natural capital, and the pressing need to understand systemic risk in a far more holistic way. Does the financial sector sufficiently understand, and therefore value and price the risks and opportunities related to BES? Such matters are increasingly pertinent for all FIs, and particularly those active in the primary economy and in resource intensive sectors. Now is the time to accelerate both the general recognition of and collective action for the integration of BES as a reputational, regulatory and potentially even systemic risk to economic and financial sustainability.
 
An important objective of this workshop is to discuss how to advance the understanding and integration of biodiversity and ecosystem service (BES) criteria and risk management, lending and investment products. To that extent we would like to hear from all participants what the best strategy is to go forward. In line with this, we will be highlighting the Biodiversity Principles that are being developed under the guidance of the VfU, as well as a UNEP FI Natural Capital Statement for Finance Institutions. This Statement is a crucial process to building momentum around biodiversity conservation, which commenced during the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity, with inception workshops in London, at the CBD COP 10 in Nagoya Japan, and in Hong Kong with Credit Suisse. En route to the United Nations Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 2012, the financial sector has a unique chance to demonstrate that it takes the loss of natural capital seriously and is taking action. We’d like to hear from participants in Munich how to make that happen.
 
 
Ivo Mulder                                                                                 Irina Detlefsen                                                     Eva Kammerer-Kirch
Programme Officer                                                       Corporate Sustainability                       Coordinator
UNEP Finance Initiative                                       HypoVereinsbank                                             VfU
 
                       
 
Please confirm your attendance by contacting Margot Hill ([email protected])
 

For some time, biodiversity has been talked about as the next big sustainability issue. Dubbed the “new carbon”, and given it’s own international year of recognition by the UN in 2010 (now extended to a decade), its clear that this is one challenge that’s here to stay.

So if this is the case, how should business set out to address its impact on biodiversity? The TEEB report (The Economics of Ecosystems & Biodiversity) says that the first step for business is to identify impacts and dependencies and then to begin to measure and report impacts, dependencies and responses. However, each of these steps presents it’s own significant challenges, meaning that knowing where to start can be extremely difficult.

To try to address some of the questions around how corporate sustainability professionals should approach biodiversity as a key business issue, we’re running an online Q&A discussion with a panel of experts.

The discussion will take place on Thursday 3rd March from 12 until 3pm and will cover areas such as:

• Is it possible (and useful) for a business to measure its biodiversity footprint?
• Should we even be talking about biodiversity as a distinct business issue (or should it in fact be something that is integrated into sustainability thinking across an organisation’s operations)?
• How can cross-sector collaboration help in addressing the biodiversity challenge?
• What does corporate best practice in terms of biodiversity look like at the moment? Who is leading and how can other organisations learn from them?
• How can investment in biodiversity and ecosystem services be encouraged?
• How can risk due to biodiversity loss be quantified and communicated?

You can either post your questions now or join us next week to follow the whole discussion. The Q&A will take place in the comments section on this page. If you can’t join us on Thursday, sign up to receive our newsletter and we’ll send you a link to a summary of the Q&A.

The first NCER, held in Orlando, FL (2004) with over 900 restoration practitioners participating, lead to successful conferences in Kansas City, MO (2007) and Los Angeles, CA (2009). NCER brings together nearly 1,000 scientists, engineers, policy makers, planners, and partners from across the country actively involved in ecosystem restoration.

Initiated by the University of Florida, U.S. Geological Survey, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service, NCER typically entails five days of presentations in six program tracks, multiple workshops, poster sessions, field trips and coffee-house discussions dedicated to both small and large scale ecosystem restoration programs including but not limited to the Missouri and Mississippi River Basins, the Louisiana Coastal Area, Columbia River, the Everglades, the San Francisco Bay/Delta, the Chesapeake Bay, Great Lakes and Puget Sound, just to name a few.

The following topics will be considered in this two-day conference.
• Corporate governance, corporate social performance and corporate social responsibility
• Sustainability reporting, CSR reporting, environmental & social reporting
• Environmental innovations, environmental management system, environmental accounting
• Life cycle assessment, cradle to grave, cradle to cradle
• Green businesses & entrepreneurship, bottom of the pyramid
• Environmental sustainability country practices
• Materials renewal & recycling, design for recycling and disassembly
• Environmental product design & process improvements
• Social and economic impact of climate change / social bottom-line
• Corporate financial performance
The conference proceedings may be published in a special issue of the RCAPS Journal. Outstanding paper
presentations may be considered for submission to the Asia PacificWorld: The Journal of the
International Association for Asia Pacific Studies (IAAPS).

Abstracts of not more than 500 words must be sent to [email protected] on or
before October 30, 2010. Notifications of acceptance will be sent by November 15, 2010. Full papers
must be submitted on or before December 30, 2010, the registration deadline.

The conference fee includes lunch for the two days, socials dinner for January 29, 2011, and conference
kit. All authors joining the conference are required to register. On-line registration is now available on
this link:
https://spreadsheets.google.com/embeddedform?formkey=dGp1bXloWEFQQjI0SG9SQ29tNmtvZkE6MQ.

Registration fees for the full amount plus bank remittance and service charges must be transferred to:
Account name “APUGSM”, account no. 5 1 3 9 1 9 0 (Swift code: O I T A J P J T 0 7 7)
Oita Bank, Taiyo No Ie Branch (大分銀行太陽の家支店)
Address: 1393 Uchikamado, Beppu-City, Oita – ken, JAPAN
Telephone: +81 977-67-0800
Zip Code: 874-0011

Japan immigration requires visa for certain nationalities. The conference committee shall send invitation
letters to the participants. However, participants should secure a visa on their own. Please check the
immigration requirements from the Japanese embassy in your country before registering for this
conference.

Conference Chairs:
Kenji Yokoyama, Dean
Graduate School of Management
Robert C. Salazar, Professor
Graduate School of Asia Pacific Studies
Michael Angelo A. Cortez, Asst. Professor
Graduate School of Management
+81 977 78 1111
+81 977 78 1232
Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University
www.apu.ac.jp
1-1 Jumonjibaru,
Beppu City
Oita Prefecture 874-8577
JAPAN