We (V. van ‘t Hoff & P. Cabral & F. O. Akinyemi, et al.) would like to bring to your attention an exciting session at the upcoming ESP Europe 2024 conference.

Conference Session: Artificial Intelligence and Ecosystem Services – Advancements in AI in the field of ecosystem services for transformative change
Date: 18-22 November 2024
Location: Wageningen, The Netherlands
Abstract Submission: Open from 15 May to 15 July 2024 (https://espconference.org/europe2024/home)

Hosted by: Felicia O. Akinyemi, Pedro Cabral, and Vince van ‘t HoffCo-hosts: Sara Alibakhshi, Bruna Almeida, Jan Haas, Ewa Orlikowska, Xi-Lillian Pang, Mieke Siebers, Guojie Wang Aim: This session explores the transformative potential of AI in understanding, monitoring, and managing ecosystem services (ES). It will highlight innovative AI solutions, such as satellite image analysis and natural language processing, which offer new ways to gather and analyze complex data. The session will cover various AI methodologies, including machine learning, deep learning, and GeoAI, and discuss their applications in assessing and modelling ES and ecosystem functions (EF).

For more information and to submit your abstract, please visit the ESP Europe 2024 website.

Why to attend?

1) This session is an excellent opportunity to stay at the forefront of advancements in AI and its applications in ecosystem services. I highly encourage you to attend and consider contributing your knowledge.

2) The communications presented at this session may be considered for inclusion in a synthesis paper or a review paper highlighting knowledge gaps in the use of AI for ecosystem services in both empirical and modelling contexts.

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Regina Lindborg, a Professor from Stockholm University will be giving a seminar entitled Biodiversity and ecosystem services from grasslands – towards a more sustainable agriculture on Tuesday 7 June 2022 at 13.15 CEST over zoom https://kau-se.zoom.us/my/kaubiology.

Regina’s research focuses on the conservation of biodiversity, with a special focus on natural pastures, and how to combine the management of ecosystem services and the conservation of biodiversity with sustainable food production in the agricultural landscape. Regina works mainly with issues that are linked to landscape ecology and processes that concern large space and time scales such as changes in land use and the effects of climate change. Several of Regina’s studies are done in interdisciplinary collaboration with researchers from other disciplines, such as economics and cultural geography.

Next week on Tuesday 29 September kl. 13.15 RivEM professor John Piccolo will hold a seminar entitled “Nature’s contribution to people and peoples’ moral obligations to nature”. He says: “In the seminar, I will discuss the concept of “ecocentrism”, the worldview that attributes “inherent” or “intrinsic” value to nonhuman (as well as human) life. The seminar is part of a project I have been working on for some time, with colleagues from several countries, to highlight the importance of ecocentrism for biodiversity conservation and sustainability, as in this recent article in the leading biodiversity journal Conservation Biology.” You’re very welcome to join John’s Zoom room (https://kau-se.zoom.us/my/jpconbio) on Tuesday 29 September, 13:15 Stockholm time!

In the seminar next week John will focus on the new concept of “Nature’s contributions to people” (NCP) that is currently being popularized by the International Panel of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). The concept of NCP is built upon a deeper understanding of the well-known Ecosystem Services paradigm. NCP attempts to capture many of the intangible values of nature that are difficult to measure, especially economically. Thus, NCP encompasses a broader range of worldviews than do previous, largely economic valuations of ecosystem services. Although the IPBES explicitly recognizes intrinsic nature value, they have done a poor job accounting for intrinsic value in their recent publications and reports. He will argue that the IPBES and biodiversity conservation in general requires a much deeper assessment of the philosophical concept of intrinsic natural value. Recognition of intrinsic value is, in fact, the foundation upon which both human rights and nature’s rights are built. Thus, intrinsic value is of primary importance in conservation of biodiversity and the broader concept of sustainability.

You can read more of their recent publications on ecocentrism at the following links:

https://conbio.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/cobi.13526

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10806-018-9711-1

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320718305020?via%3Dihub

https://conbio.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/cobi.13067

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1617138117300742?via%3Dihub

You can even read a statement of commitment to ecocentrism, and join a list of notable signatories at the following link: https://www.ecologicalcitizen.net/statement-of-ecocentrism.php?submit=Sign+the+Ecocentrism+Statement

On Tuesday 2 June Sanna Stålhammar at the Lund University Centre for Sustainability Studies will give a seminar entitled “Reconnecting with nature through concepts: On the construction of values in the ecosystem services paradigm”.

The seminar starts at 13:15 and will be held online and streamed on Zoom. The seminar is open for everyone who wants to attend. We will not distribute the zoom link to the seminar publicly online. If you want to attend the seminar, contact John Piccolo (john.piccolo@kau.se), and he will send you a zoom link so that you can participate.