The overall goal of our research on the economics of ecosystem services and natural capital is to guide decisions and inform policies on ecosystems and prosperity.
By providing insight into people’s preferences and their values for ecosystem services and natural capital, we aim to help design solutions such as decision-support tools for environmental management and business cases for nature-based solutions.
Below an overview
How can Nature-based Solutions (NbS) be scaled across wide geographical areas in a fair and just way, to contribute to climate mitigation, biodiversity conservation, and societal well-being? This project develops a multidimensional framework to ensure social and ecological justice when applying NbS in diverse contexts. With six European action cases in the Netherlands, Belgium, Denmark, France, Hungary, and Spain, FairNature investigates how NbS can be scaled in ways that promote justice and sustainability. The approach combines reflexive learning labs, transdisciplinary methods, and intensive stakeholder engagement to deliver practical solutions. The FairNature Guide will offer tangible tools and policy recommendations to ensure scaling efforts are both fair and effective, ultimately supporting a just transformation. IVM leads this project, which is funded by Biodiversa+.
Contact information: Dr Marije Schaafsma, Dr Ina Lehmann and Dr Alexandra Krendelsberger
Dutch sand landscapes are vulnerable to droughts, floods, pollution and are losing soil carbon and biodiversity. RESHAPE is a NWO-KIC project that aims to 1) develop nature-inspired water system solutions to reactivate landscape resilience and 2) identify effective economic and governance arrangements to achieve this transformation. IVM leads the work package on natural resource economics to quantify trade-offs between ecosystem services, and assessing the incentives required for regional water actors to deal with droughts.
Project website: https://reshape.labs.vu.nl/
Contact information: Zsóka Halászová, Dr Mark Koetse and Dr Marije Schaafsma
Accelerated sea level rise seriously threatens coastal areas globally. Coastal sand nourishments – the addition of sand to increase the beach volume – are potentially a key method to sustainably adapt to accelerated sea-level rise and keep the low-lying hinterland protected. SOURCE develops critically-needed coastal ecosystem knowledge which will allow us to make models that can, for the first time, reliably predict nourishment impacts on key coastal state indicators. The project will determine the ecological impacts, and explore the potential of using nourished sand for new habitat creation. The integrated design process will lead to innovative nourishment strategies, co-created with stakeholders. The project’s Living Lab is a sand nourishment along the Dutch coast, which will be designed, constructed and evaluated.
Contact information: Dr Marije Schaafsma, Dr Peter Robinson and Yudha Pratama
Functional agrobiodiversity (FAB) to support natural pest control in arable crops has a high potential to reduce pesticide use and to enhance biodiversity, without compromising crop yields. Despite this potential, mainstreaming FAB is hindered by among others inadequate economic incentives for farmers for FAB adoption. IVM leads a work package in which we improve natural capital models to quantify costs and benefits of FAB adoption, using scenarios with payments for ecosystem services to farmers.
Contact information: Dr Mark Koetse and Prof. Pieter van Beukering
ARCADIA is a Horizon Europe project consisting of 40+ partners, aiming to enhance the knowledge and implementation of nature-based solutions (NBS) for climate adaptation and optimising (economic) co-benefits. IVM leads a work package on values and perceptions of NBS, of various societal actors and for 8 regions in Europe, creating crucial insights for governance and finance of NBS and stimulating NBS adoption across Europe.
Contact information: Teun Schrieks, Magdalena Lesch, Dr Mark Koetse and Prof. Wouter Botzen
The project "Green adaptation pathways for a resilient future for river basins under increasing extreme floods and droughts" (GreenAdapt2Extremes) focuses on three tributaries (Dora Baltea, Geul, Erft) that are sensitive to floods and droughts. The aim of the project, funded through the European partnership Water4All, is to work with stakeholders in these rivers to devise new ways to deal with floods and droughts, through a participatory approach, analysis of current and future risks, and evaluation of Nature-Based Solutions. IVM leads the work on multi-level governance and valuation of co-benefits of NBS.
Contact information: Dr Marije Schaafsma, Dr Marthe Wens and Shahana Bilalova
Land use strategies must juggle multiple competing objectives around production, recreation, infrastructure, housing, climate change and biodiversity loss. PLUS Change is a Horizon Europe funded project which aims to develop land use strategies that meet environmental and human well-being objectives, and interventions to achieve these strategies. The project has an interdisciplinary approach, studying land use from political, economic, societal and cultural angles, using a variety of methods including land use modelling, media analysis and behavioral experiments. The objectives of the project will be carried out by over 20 consortium partners and linked to 11 in-depth practice cases across Europe, with a diverse range of stakeholders. The work of the IVM team focuses on understanding historical land use changes, modelling land use scenarios and their impacts, exploring the role of values in people’s land related behaviors and on testing the effectiveness of interventions to change such behaviors. VU also manages and works with the Dutch peri-urban practice case, the Waterland-Zaanstreek area north of Amsterdam.
Project website: https://pluschange.eu/
Contact information: Dr Marije Schaafsma, Dr Hung Nguyen, Dr Nynke Schulp and Ilse Nijensteen
PIISA (Piloting Innovation Insurance Solutions for Adaptation) is a Horizon Europe project that brings together 12 organisations from 5 European countries, and will co-develop climate resilient insurance portfolios, as well as develop solutions for sharing climate-related risk and losses data. The focal sectors benefiting from the project are agriculture, forestry, cities and citizens’ well-being, tackling a host of climate enhanced hazards such as floods, droughts, forest fires, biotic risks, and various types of storms.
Project website: https://piisa-project.eu/home
Contact information: Dr Peter Robinson, Dr Georges Farina, Prof. Pieter van Beukering and Michiel Ingels
VeenVitaal is a NWA-ORC project, featuring a living lab that includes all relevant regional actors, and investigates which interventions in Dutch peatmeadows are effective to restore biodiversity, halt peat degradation and greenhouse gas emissions, make business operations on peat meadows profitable for farmers and landowners, and provide an inspiring landscape for citizens. IVM leads the work package on alternative business models for farmers.
Project website: https://veenvitaal.info/
Contact information: Jorn van Elden, Dr Mark Koetse, Prof. Pieter van Beukering and Dr Marije Schaafsma
The Spatial non-market VAluation for Biodiversity (SVAB) project aims to develop a novel spatially explicit survey valuation methodology to improve the accuracy of non-market valuation of biodiversity. The methodology is used to assess the non-market values associated with improvements of existing natural areas (e.g. Natura 2000) or creation of new such areas across the Czech Republic.
Project website: https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/101030693
Contact information: Dr Tomáš Baďura and Dr Marije Schaafsma
CITIES2030 is a H2020 project that studies and supports the developments of sustainable food systems at city and region scale. It does so by initiating or further developing living labs and policy labs in a widely diverse set of European cities and regions. IVM leads WP4 on policy labs, studying and supporting the different ways that policies at city and regional levels may enhance sustainable food systems.
Project website: https://cities2030.eu/
Contact information: Dr Suzanne van Osch and Dr Mark Koetse
The PRORISK Network aims to establish a ground-breaking platform for Early Stage Researchers (ESRs) in the field of advanced Environmental Risk Assessment (ERA). Comprising an interdisciplinary group of 14 PhD students (ESRs), alongside research institutions, enterprises, and partner organizations in Europe and Canada, the network aims to address the pressing need to incorporate ecosystem service valuation in regulatory policy. This approach seeks to halt biodiversity loss and ecosystem degradation by encompassing various aspects, from basic laboratory tests to a comprehensive approach integrating mechanistic, ecological, and socio-economic factors. The program uniquely offers integrative and interdisciplinary training in ERA, advocating a shift from traditional toxicity testing to a more holistic, ecosystem services-oriented risk assessment approach. Research objectives encompass quantifying chemical-biological interactions, expanding adverse outcome pathways (AOPs), and proposing a holistic framework linking AOPs and ecosystem services through ecological modelling and socio-economic assessments within case studies.
Project website: https://www.recetox.muni.cz/prorisk
Contact information: Elvia Rufo Jimenez, Prof. Pieter van Beukering and Prof. Roy Brouwer
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