ECOPOTENTIAL: Improving Future Ecosystem Benefits through Earth Observations

1.2.3 Methodology Twenty-two Protected Areas and their managers are involved in ECOPOTENTIAL. The Protected Areas are distributed across mountain (fourteen), arid/semi-arid (five), and coastal and marine ecosystems (seven). Please note that some Protected Areas are represented in more than one ecosystem type, accounting for the discrepancy in totals. The Projected Areas involved in ECOPOTENTIAL can be seen in Figure 1. Information was collected from questionnaires provided to each Protected Area manager or another relevant staff member (see Appendix 2 of D.11.1 for complete questionnaire). Contained within the questionnaire package sent to the Protected Areas was an introduction to the ECOPOTENTIAL project, an introduction to the concept of ecosystemservices, andanoverviewof the use and possibilities of Earth Observation. This introduction aimed to create a shared basic understanding of the terminology and the project framework. The questionnaire addresses three thematic areas: • Goals and management of and challenges faced by the Protected Areas (Section 1) • Data collection methods and additional known needs (Section 2) • Potential collaboration with ECOPOTENTIAL (Section 3) (communication of results, also in this section, is addressed in D.11.1)

This analysis focusses on parts of all three areas of the questionnaire. The specific questions addressed in this report are found in Appendix 1. The questionnaires were completed by the Protected Area managers or other relevant staff for seventeen of the twenty-two participating areas (see Appendix 2 for a list of the Protected Areas and details of questionnaire completion). Twelve of the represented areas are located within eleven EU member states, while the other five are in Moldova, Switzerland, Israel, Norway and South Africa. 1.3 Overview of EU frameworks relating to Ecosystem Services In this section, we provide the European policy context for the management of Protected Areas in ECOPOTENTIAL. We discuss existing instruments that deal with environmental and/or ecological protection on a European scale, and their relation to the conservation of Protected Areas and ecosystem services. Since Earth Observation is a potentially valuable tool for measuring ecosystem services, we also look at the application of Earth Observation in Protected Areas. We look into both the legislation as well as policy instruments for all environments in which the concept of ecosystem services is being used, and provide a brief overview of any specific policies for the marine/coastal, mountain and semi-arid environments.

Figure 1 : Ecopotential Project Sites

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