Landscape and biodiversity values in Switzerland – insights from the interdisciplinary research project ValPar.CH.

This is a special seminar co-organized by the WSL Landscape Center and the WSL Biodiversity Center.

The interdisciplinary research project “ValPar.CH – Values of the ecological infrastructure in Swiss parks” investigates the benefits and added value of the ecological infrastructure (EI) in Switzerland. More than 30 researchers from five Swiss universities are analysing the values of EI from a social, economic and ecological perspective. ValPar.CH is commissioned by the Swiss Federal Office for the Environment and is part of the Action Plan for the Swiss Biodiversity Strategy.

Our presentation will focus on different landscape and biodiversity values in Switzerland: Specifically, Annina Michel will provide insights into social values that have been derived through a combination of different methods, both within the study regions (regional nature parks) and outside. Antoine Adde will focus on the biodiversity modelling part  of the project, including the development of a high-performance species distribution pipeline that combines state-of the-art techniques. This pipeline provides standardised and reproducible data to assess the state and trends of the ecosystems and biodiversity. Roger Keller will give an overview of the different work packages and results of ValPar.CH and provide insights into the science-policy-practice interface.

• Annina Michel is a human geographer and group leader at the Department of Geography, University of Zurich, as well as a lecturer at the St. Gallen University of Teacher Education. Her research focuses on human-nature relationships, landscape meanings, and environmental justice.
• Antoine Adde is a postdoctoral researcher at Eawag and Université de Lausanne. His research activities are focused on spatial predictive modelling of species distributions. He is particularly interested in advancing methods and developing new tools to help better understand and predict species niches and distributions.
• Roger Keller is a geographer, senior scientist and project manager at the Department of Geography, University of Zurich. He currently coordinates the interdisciplinary research project ValPar.CH and is particularly interested in the science-policy-practice-interface.

Our seminars are hybrid. Please send an email to events-biodiversity(at)wsl.ch if you would like to get access to the live stream.

The Biodiversity Seminar Series are organized by the WSL Biodiversity Center. Every two weeks, we aim to host a seminar speaker that presents research or outreach on topics relevant to the biodiversity community at WSL. The seminars are public and are usually broadcasted online.

To find out more about the WSL Biodiversity Center and a complete list of events, please visit our website. 

Please send an email to events-biodiversity(at)wsl.ch if you would like to be updated on the activities of the WSL Biodiversity Center.