Online conference to seek input for the scoping process for the transformative change assessment

Purpose and outcome

This online conference represents an innovation for IPBES. Its purpose is to seek the broadest possible input (scientists and other knowledge holders, representatives of Governments, and of institutions and organisations, etc.), at this very initial phase in the production of an IPBES assessment, to define the policy-relevant questions that the assessment will address, and to thus make the assessment as relevant as possible to a diversity of stakeholders. The purpose is not to define the structure at this early stage, nor the set of chapters, but to collect the policy-relevant questions that stakeholders would like to see addressed by the assessment.

The outcome of this online conference will consist in a report which will be presented to the group of scoping experts at their meeting and contribute to the scoping report which these experts will draft.

Process

The Plenary, at IPBES 7 (April-May 2019, Paris), adopted a new work programme (2019-2030; available here), following up on the first IPBES work programme 2014-2018, which culminated with the approval of the IPBES Global Assessment of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services at IPBES 7.

This new work programme includes a thematic assessment of transformative change whose objective would be to understand and identify factors in human society at both the individual and collective levels, including behavioural, social, cultural, economic, institutional, technical and technological dimensions, that may be leveraged to bring about transformative change for the conservation, restoration and wise use of biodiversity, while taking into account broader social and economic goals in the context of sustainable development.

The first step in the production of this assessment, as for all IPBES assessments, consists in defining the scope of the assessment, including the overall framework, set of chapters, and their brief content, and a timeline and budget for its production. This will be done at a “scoping meeting” in April 2020. The “scoping report” produced at that meeting will be considered by the Plenary at IPBES 8. If approved, the assessment would begin immediately after IPBES 8, with a call for experts to produce that assessment.

This pre-scoping online conference forms part of the scoping process and contributes to the scoping report.

Agenda

This on-line conference took place over 3 days, from Wednesday 9 October (Day 1), to Friday 11 October 2019 (Day 3). Day 1 was dedicated to reflecting on “transformative change as system change”, asking what transformative change is, and why a system-change perspective and transformative change in particular may be crucial for the long-term conservation, restoration and wise use of biodiversity. Day 2 focused on what to change and introduced key points of intervention (i.e. leverage points) that would be conducive to change (e.g. embracing diverse visions of a good life, reducing consumption and wastes, unleashing values). Finally, day 3 discussed how to change the system, focusing on the types of management and governance interventions from a variety of actors that appear the most promising in various contexts (e.g. incentives, cross-sectoral cooperation, environmental law and implementation).

Each part began with an introductory talk (15 mn), followed by a moderated oral exchange (2 hours), ending with a period of about 24 hours for written contributions.

Day 1 (Wednesday 9 October 2019): Introduction and topic 1 (transformative change as a system change)

Day 2 (Thursday 10 October 2019): Topic 2 (What to change?)

Day 3 (Friday 11 October 2019): Topic 3 (How to change the system?)