Progress in European Biodiversity Indicators and monitoring

Invited by DG Environment of the European Commission, the Biodiversity Group on Monitoring and Indicators met in Brussels, on the 25th of September 2006, to discuss the progress of several initiatives.

Release date	08/10/2006
Contributor	spyropoulou
Concerned URL	http://biodiversity-chm.eea.europa.eu/convention/cbd_ec/F1034865978/fol903888/fol513496
Source	DG ENV

This was the fifth meeting of the EU Biodiversity Working Group on Indicators, Monitoring, Reporting, Data management and Information sharing. Several experts from Member States and other stakeholders participated and discussed progress in the related fields.

One of the most central items was the discussion about the recently adopted EU Biodiversity Communication (May 2006) and most specifically on its monitoring, evaluation and review. The text of the Communication is available at http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=CELEX:52006DC0216:EN:NOT Work on biodiversity Indicators is included in the Annexes of the Biodiversity Communication and is referring mainly to the SEBI 2010 process. Hence, the European Environment Agency presented an update on the work on SEBI 2010 (Streamlining European Biodiversity Indicators), including current outcomes, latest progress and questions to be addressed.

Important Biodiversity considerations are also included in the frame of the EU Structural and Sustainable Development Indicators as well as in the developments of EU agricultural and fishery policy. The relevant updates and plans of these processes were also presented and discussed.

The Joint Research Center presented the development of an algorithm for analysing spatial patterns of forests, BirdLife presented their further work on bird indicators and the United Kingdom presented progress on their national implementation of CBD/EU 2010 indicator framework).

All relevant presentations have been uploaded in the EC CHM, see link at the end of the page.

Participants were presented the scope and progress of research projects for monitoring and indicator work funded by DG Research, including Coconut & MACIS, EUMON and BioScore.

As a final point in its Agenda, the meeting discussed the development of a shared information system for biodiversity in Europe and positively contributed to the mapping and linking of the different ongoing initiatives, that could be useful in supporting an Ecosystem Assessment for Europe.