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SCIENCE INFORMING POLICY SYMPOSIUM SERIES FROM THE SUBLIME TO THE BOTTOM LINE ECOSYSTEM SERVICES & PROTECTED AREAS: AUSTRALIAN AND REGIONAL PERSPECTIVES 21-22 July 2014, The Shore Function Centre, South Bank, Brisbane You are warmly invited - Please reserve the dates This is the fifth in the ‘Science informing Policy Symposium Series’ convened by the Australian National Committee for IUCN. This symposium is in partnership with Griffith University (Climate Change Response Program), Parks Victoria, The Nature Conservancy, the Australian Conservation Foundation and the IUCN Oceania Regional Office. Background Throughout the world terrestrial, marine, coastal, and inland water ecosystems deliver many benefits or ‘services’ that underpin human livelihoods, economies and well-being. However, these ecosystems, and the wealth of life they support, are declining at an unprecedented rate. To address this challenge requires sound policy at local, national and international levels. Often such natural landscapes - and the wildlife and ecosystems they contain are seen through a narrow economic lens focused on conventional means of valuation through monetary return such as tourism, mining, logging, agriculture, and infrastructure development. In partnership with: If we broaden our perspective, however, we can gain a richer appreciation of the full range of benefits we gain from intact nature, often best protected in our national parks and other protected areas, benefits which economists are now calling “ecosystem services”. Ecosystem services include such benefits as fresh water, erosion prevention, pollination, nature based tourism, flood mitigation and climate change mitigation and adaptation. However, more broadly the concept encompasses the contribution of protected areas to human health and well-being (both mental and physical). Nature also generates profound aesthetic, inspirational and cultural values including Indigenous knowledge and practices. The ecosystem services approach - done properly - can provide vital information for policy and decision makers in the face of increasing pressures and stressors on our protected areas and emerging threats such as climate change. Underlying the provision of ecosystem services is the concept of “green infrastructure” – the native species, ecological communities and biophysical processes that constitute and sustain natural ecosystems. Healthy, well-managed protected areas are significant reservoirs of this green infrastructure and therefore vital national assets. Undervaluation will, in contrast, lead to serious, and often permanent, degradation and losses. Proper valuation of ecosystems has been recognised as a global priority. This is reflected at international level by the establishment by the United Nations of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). IPBES has been established to be the leading intergovernmental body for assessing the state of the planet's biodiversity, its ecosystems and the essential services they provide to society (http://www.ipbes.net/). Other international and national activities providing impetus for advancing understanding of the ecosystem services include: The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB) initiative (http://www.teebweb.org/ ); U.N. Statistics Division’s work on Experimental Ecosystem Accounts (SEEA) which produces internationally comparable statistics on the environment and its relationship with the economy; The Australia Bureau of Statistics program of environmental-economic accounts: Well documented case studies of protected area valuation in countries such as Canada; Promotion through the U.N. system of the “green” and “blue” economies (http://www.unep.org/greeneconomy/); and Increasing political pressure for further justification of ongoing public and private funding of protected areas. Purpose The partners of this symposium wish to catalyse interest in, and understanding of, the ecosystem services approach to accounting for and valuing the benefits of intact In partnership with: natural systems including forests, wetlands, woodlands, grasslands, rivers and flood plains, alpine meadows, and rainforests. Decision makers need science-based and independent information that highlights the relationships between biodiversity, ecosystem services, people and appropriate management and governance mechanisms. The symposium will look particularly at how protected areas, as our most effective mechanism to protect these natural attributes, deliver benefits and how these can be accounted for and valued. It will also address how intact nature holds strong cultural, health and well-being values which people cherish and seek to secure and pass on to future generations. In examining how we can account for and value the full range of ecosystem services from protected areas the symposium will provide critical information for a range of policy questions and management decision making and encourage more comprehensive approaches to the valuation of protected areas. Audience The symposium aims to bring together biodiversity, environmental economics and protected area specialists from government, non-government and academic sectors and particularly target decision makers at national and state levels. It also aims to include the voices of sectors who benefit from ecosystems services such as the Indigenous community, rural land holders such as floodplain farmers, local governments, the tourism industry and importantly those who are exploring the important connections between nature and human health and well-being. Outputs A report will be published by ACIUCN that documents the main ideas, cases studies and recommendations emerging from the symposium on national priorities for accounting and valuation of nature and protected areas for the next decade. The symposium outcomes will also feed into the IUCN World Parks Congress being held in Sydney, November 2014. Speakers will be required to submit summaries in July. Register for information updates Please register your interest in this Symposium by accessing the ACIUCN website and filling in contact information on the event registration site. We will keep you updated as the program develops and advise you when formal registration is open. Register here. http://aciucn.org.au/index.php/ecosystemssymposium/ Contacts The key contacts for the Symposium will be ACIUCN Director, Penelope Figgis AO and Prof. Brendan Mackey (please note that Ms Figgis is absent overseas until the 18th April). Kathy Zischka can be contacted over any problems with registration. [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]) In partnership with: