ECOPOTENTIAL: Improving future ecosystem benefits through earth observations

Figure 1: Peneda-Gerês National Park (Portugal)

The ECOPOTENTIAL project focus on the protection and conservation of the main ecosystem services provided by a set of 22 internationally recognised protected areas (PAs) chosen among National Parks, Natura 2000 sites, and UNESCO World Natural Heritage Sites in Europe, European Territories and beyond, including mountain, arid and semi-arid, and coastal and marine ecosystems. These PAs provide essential services to human societies. However, climate change and anthropogenic pressures cause serious threats to these ecosystems, leading to habitat degradation and increased risk of loss of ecosystem services. The ECOPOTENTIAL project aims at improving the monitoring and modeling of these ecosystem services with the final goal of establish conservation, management and restoration policies to improve ecosystem benefits also under scenarios of increasing pressures. Remote sensing experts and ecological modelers collaborate in the ECOPOTENTIAL project to make best use of Earth Observation (EO) and monitoring data and develop new modelling approaches to assess the current and future conditions of the PAs.  Knowledge gained in the PAs will be upscaled to pan-European conditions and used for planning and management of future Pas. The ECOPOTENTIAL project involves 47 partners, it is financed from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research project and co-financed by the Swiss confederation.

Figure 2 : Gran Paradiso National Park (Italy)

Video: Project: improving future ecosystem benefits through earth observations.

Main page of the project ECOPOTENTIAL:

Relevant publications:

• Geomorphic controls on elevational gradients of species richness

Funding agencie(s) : I