Dialogue meeting: Municipalities and the GBF
In December, the BIOSPHERE project group held a dialogue meeting about the Global Biodiversity Framework goals with stakeholders from the Nordhordland municipalities as the finally of the resilience assessment that has been taking place this autumn.
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Throughout the autumn, the BIOSPHERE project group has been conducting a resilience assessment in Alver municipality, the biggest municipality in Nordhordland Biosphere Reserve. The focus of the analysis has been the Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) and the Norwegian action plan for how to follow up on the GBF goals. The process has consisted of two workshops specifically with employees and other stakeholders (e.g. interest groups for agriculture or outdoor recreation) from Alver.
In the first workshop, participants learned about the GBF goals and evaluated which goals were a problem/should be a priority in Alver, and which goals the municipality has a mandate to affect. They also identified knowledge gaps regarding working towards these goals. The goals that were categorized both as a priority and as something the municipality can affect were the focus of the second workshop: here, the participants worked in groups to list actions that are currently, or could easily, strengthen the status of one or more goals, and which stakeholders could or should be involved.
During this workshop series, the Norwegian government announced their action plan for reaching the GBF goals nationally, which put a lot of the responsibility on the municipalities. Therefore, the third workshop, titled Dialogue meeting: Municipalities and the GBF, focused on how municipalities can work towards the GBF goals. This event was open to a bigger audience, including employees and politicians from the other Nordhordland municipalities, representatives from the county government, ecologists and representatives from agriculture interest groups.
The participants at the Dialogue meeting got to learn a bit more about the GBF and the resilience analysis process, before having a chance to discuss the four points that had stood聽聽聽聽聽 out throughout the workshops:
- Raising awareness聽in municipalities 鈥� how can we do it? What formats and target groups should we focus on?
- Data accessibility and 鈥渄ata etiquette鈥�: Format, logistics, and analysis and interpretation support
- Practical implementation of the GBF: What potential are there in Norwegian municipalities to work with the GBF goals?
- Nature management on different levels: what kind of support and coordination is needed from regional and national levels for municipalities to be able to work with the GBF?
The research group will continue working with the results of the resilience assessment in, but a report from the first to workshops are already available (see below under Documents; only available in Norwegian).
