Working together to add value: Enhancing landscapes for biodiversity and multiple ecosystem services

管理生物多样性和多种生态系统服务的景观是研究人员、政策制定者、从业人员和其他利益攸关方当前的优先事项。有几项倡议鼓励在景观一级进行合作管理，例如“集水区敏感农业”和农村管理机构的“便利基金”，其重点是保护生物多样性以及提高土壤和水的质量以及减轻洪水。有多个由农民、土地管理者和保护组织组成的“集群”，它们属于这些倡议，通过这些倡议，几个利益相关者聚集在一起，在景观规模上合作管理地块，以提供更高的效益。还有一些社区，如“将环境与农业联系起来(LEAFE)”和“农业和野生动物咨询小组(FWAG)”，在多个利益相关者社区之间分享信息并加强良好做法，如果要实现25年环境计划的愿望，所有这些都是至关重要的。对于不同部门，包括农业(粮食生产、授粉、土壤)、保护非政府组织(野生动植物)、公用事业公司(水质)、普通公众(公共产品)和政策制定者(有效使用公共资金、环境保护和粮食安全)来说，合作管理方法是有益的。然而，根据利益相关者的优先事项，存在不可避免的权衡和可能的多种解决方案。因此，需要透明的、以证据为导向的程序，以帮助优化土地使用选择，以最大限度地满足不同社区的需要。科学研究可以提供独立、透明的信息，构成现有证据领域的关键。虽然专注于生物多样性和生态系统服务的特定方面的单个研究项目在探索具体假设方面很重要，但这些项目很少单独有用。对政策制定者、从业者社区和咨询团体特别有用的是来自多个研究项目的相关信息，这些信息可以以相关和容易获取的方式加以整理、综合和提供。大多数研究项目的重点是找到相关问题的解决办法，但仍然需要将这些研究结果整理并转化为可获得的形式，在这种形式下，知识交流研究金可以建设能力并增加巨大价值。该奖学金旨在汇集雷丁大学NERC资助的几个项目的信息，这些项目评估景观水平的干预措施以及对生物多样性和生态系统服务的影响，以帮助景观规模的合作管理决策。该奖学金将创建一个知识中心，由来自不同社区的利益相关者聚集在一起，以(A)从现有项目中获得信息，(B)向研究人员通报证据需求，(C)分享现实世界的经验和良好做法。来自政策部门、保育非政府组织、独立土地顾问、土地管理人员和业主以及研究人员的代表将通过这个知识中心分享信息，这也将使知识能够转移到利益相关者所属的更广泛的网络中。通过一系列讲习班和协商，将制定方法和工具，使多方行为者多情景决策能够找到与具体情况相关和相关的管理选择。这些情景将包括环境(未来的气候和土地使用)以及利益相关者将帮助制定的未来政策(英国退欧后)选项，以最大限度地满足他们的需求。翻译成无障碍格式的研究项目的成果以及决策工具和信息播客将放在作为研究金一部分设立的网站上，并将在项目期限结束后提供。

Managing landscapes for biodiversity and multiple ecosystem services is a current priority for researchers, policy makers, practitioners and other stakeholders. Several initiatives exist that encourage cooperative management at the landscape level such as "Catchment sensitive farming" and the Countryside Stewardship's "Facilitation funds" that focus on biodiversity conservation as well as enhancing soil and water quality and flood mitigation. There are multiple 'clusters' of farmers, land managers, and conservation organisations, that fall under these initiatives whereby several stakeholders come together to cooperatively manage land parcels at landscape scales to deliver enhanced benefits. There also exist communities such as the "Linking Environment and Farming (LEAF)" and the "Farming and Wildlife Advisory Group (FWAG)" that share information and enhance good practice amongst multiple stakeholder communities, all of which are critically important if the aspirations of the 25 year environment plan are to be met.There are benefits to a cooperative management approach for different sectors including, farming (food production, pollination, soil), conservation NGOs (wildlife), utility companies (water quality), general public (public goods) and policy makers (effective use of public money, environmental protection and food security). There are however, inevitable trade-offs and also possible multiple solutions depending on the priorities of the stakeholders. There is therefore need for transparent, evidence-led processes to help optimise land use choices to best meet the needs of the different communities involved. Scientific research can provide independent transparent information forming a linchpin in the sphere of available evidence. While single research projects focused on particular aspects of biodiversity and ecosystem services are important in exploring specific hypotheses, these are rarely useful in isolation. Particularly useful for policy makers, practitioner communities and advisory groups is pertinent information from multiple research projects that can be collated, consolidated and delivered in a relevant and easily accessible manner. Most research projects focus on finding the solution to pertinent issues but there is still a need to collate and translate these findings into accessible formats which is where a knowledge exchange fellowship can build capacity and add immense value. This fellowship aims to bring together information from several NERC funded projects across the University of Reading that assess landscape level interventions and impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem services to aid cooperative management decisions at the landscape scale.The fellowship will create a knowledge hub comprising of stakeholders from different communities coming together to (a) gain information from existing projects, (b) inform researchers of evidence needs and (c) share real-world experience and good practices. Representatives from the policy sector, conservation NGOs, independent land advisers, land managers and owners as well as researchers will share information via this knowledge hub which will also enable transfer of knowledge to wider networks that the stakeholders are part of. Through a serious of workshops and consultations, methods and tools will be developed to enable multi-actor multiple scenario decision making to find management options that are relevant and pertinent to specific contexts. The scenarios will include both environment (future climate and land -use) as well as future policy (post-Brexit) options that the stakeholder will help formulate to best suit their needs. The outputs from research projects translated into accessible formats, as well as the decision making tools and information podcasts will be hosted on a website set up as part of the Fellowship and will be available beyond the tenure of the project.