Call for Experts - IPBES

Our Ref: EM/2016/22

Dear IPBES Member States and Observers,

 Following the outcome of the fourth session of the Plenary (Decision IPBES-4/1, section III, para. 3, and section IV, para.5) and in line with the agreed procedures for the preparation of the Platform’s deliverables, Governments and other relevant stakeholders are invited to nominate experts to participate in:

1. the Global Assessment on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (Deliverable 2c);
2. the workshop to further scope the thematic assessment of the Sustainable Use of Biodiversity (Deliverable 3biii).

In addition, following decision IPBES-4/1, section I, para.1, Governments and relevant institutions and organizations are invited to nominate fellows to:

3. the IPBES Fellowship Pilot Programme, to participate in the Global Assessment on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.

The IPBES Fellowship Pilot Programme targets early career experts who wish to gain experience by participating in the work of IPBES. More information on the IPBES Fellowship Pilot Programme and nomination process can be found here.

Member States and Observers are invited to disseminate this call for nominations widely to relevant institutions and organisations. Nominations from a broad range of organizations/institutions are encouraged. Self-nominations will not be accepted. Nominators are expected to give their consent to the time commitment required from the candidate, as appropriate.

All nominated individuals (nominees) need to be available to attend the meeting to which they are applying to be experts.
Meeting dates:

• The First Author Meeting for the Global Assessment on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services will be held in August 15-19, 2016 in Bonn, Germany (Experts and Fellows);
• The scoping meeting for the thematic assessment of Sustainable Use of Biodiversity will be held August 2-4, 2016, Bonn, Germany (Scoping Experts).

Importantly, nominated experts should have expertise in one or more disciplines within natural science, social science or humanities, represent or have expertise in indigenous and local knowledge systems, or be policy experts and practitioners. We strongly encourage nominations to reflect this broad range of expertise which is needed for both assessments.

In particular, for the Global Assessment on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, we are seeking experts with an interdisciplinary, international and/or global background and experience. Governments and organisations nominating experts are therefore encouraged to promote this multidisciplinary approach, which is fundamental to the success of IPBES. For the scoping meeting for the thematic assessment of Sustainable Use of Biodiversity, we are seeking experts that have expertise in integrative approaches to human-nature relations, in ethics, trade, as well as in the relevant institutions and governance.

The nomination process of experts will follow these steps:

1. Nominees will be invited to fill out an application form and attach their curricula vitae through the dedicated web portal (http://www.ipbes.net/applicationform)
2. The application form will automatically be sent to the nominating Government or Organisation (Nominator) indicated by the Nominee with an email, which will provide a link to a nomination form inviting the Nominators to approve and submit their nominations.
3. Nominators and Nominees will  receive an acknowledgement message once the nomination form confirming the nomination has been submitted

Interested experts (nominees) are requested to fill out their application form no later than 05 May 2016. Nominators (governments or organisations) should submit approved applications by 15 May 2016 at the latest. Early nominations ahead of the deadline are encouraged. Experts interested in being nominated are encouraged to contact their IPBES National Focal Point (http://www.ipbes.net/about/members/nfps) or organisational contact point as they may be operating under their own timeline.

I look forward to your positive response to this letter and for your continued support towards the implementation of our work programme in 2016.

Yours sincerely,

This document has been signed electronically and contains no handwritten signature

Sir Robert T. Watson
Chair, Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services

Our mailing address is:
IPBES Secretariat

UN Campus

Platz der Vereinten Nationen 1

Bonn 53113

Germany

IPBES - Second call, for next set of experts

Dear IBS members,

The IPBES has opened its second call for experts this time to

1)     Scope a set of regional and sub-regional assessments

a.     Expert group for Africa

b.     Expert group for Asia and Pacific

c.     Expert gropu for the Americas and the Carribbean

d.     Expert group for Europe and Central Asia

e.     Expert group for Antarctica (NB: Arctic regions will be integrated in relevant regional scopoing meetings)

And,

2)     Scope a thematic assessment of land degradation and restoration

If you are an expert on any of these regions (scope 1) or theme (scope 2), are an IBS member and want to contribute to the IPBES process you can get nominated through the International Biogeography Society. Any other organisation as well as country delegation may nominate you as well. The nomination process through IBS works as follows:

1)      You need to fill out an Application form and attach your Curriculum Vitae through the dedicated web portal (http://www.ipbes.net/applicationform.html). If you come from a supported country you are requested to submit a scanned copy of your passport to facilitate travel arrangements in case you are selected.

2)      The Application Form will automatically be sent to the Nominating Organisation (Nominator – in other words, IBS if you go through us) indicated by you with an email which will provide a link to a Nomination Form inviting us to approve and submit your nomination.

3)      If we (the IBS Special Committee on IPBES) approve your nomination you will receive an acknowledgement message once the Nomination Form confirming the nomination is submitted by us.

Important Notes: Before you submit your nomination request – please make sure that

1.     you are available at the respective dates for the expert group you want to be involved in

2.     if you are not from a supported country – that you have funds to attend the working group meetings. The International Biogeography Society does not have funds to support you.

Please note that a subsequent call for nominations for experts to contribute to other work programme deliverables (invasive alien species, and sustainable use and conservation of biodiversity; work programme deliverables 3bii and 3biii)) will be circulated later this year.

IPBES-1 day 6

IPBES up and running with Prof. Zakri of Malaysia as its Chair

The final day of the in-session process brought about some impressive consensus-building. After a vote had already been setup for the position Chair of IPBES, Mexico asked for yet another chance to come to a consensus decision. And indeed, after a long evening and a long morning of negotiations, the different delegations after all came to an agreement: the candidate of the Asia-Pacific States, Professor Zakri Abdul Hamid, was elected chair, while Prof. Sir Watson withdrew his bid for this position and instead was elected one of the vice-chairs. Part of the compromise was that the tenure of the chair lasts three years only and that there is no possibility for re-election. Furthermore, for the 2^nd term, the Western Europe and Other States will have the privilege to nominate the candidate for the chair – thus their candidate, Prof. Sir Watson could become the 2^nd chair of IPBES. The right to nominate the chair will then circulate among the regions. Of course this setting only holds in case the 5 UN regions will stay the regional structure of IPBES. As mentioned earlier, the debate revolving around this issue, is still ongoing, and will be taken up by the MEP during the next two years.

Another important issue could not be resolved for good: future admission of observers. All rules dealing with this issue are still bracketed – meaning they will have to be negotiated during IPBES-2. As interim solution for the next plenary session it was decided that all observers present this time are automatically granted observer status for the next time if they wish. Potential new observers must registered with the secretariat, the bureau makes a list and sends it to all members 8 weeks in advance. Each member can veto any potential new observer. But this veto can be overruled by 2/3 of the plenary.  

After a long week of dealing with rules and procedures and the establishment of IPBES one might wonder when the real work will start. In other words, where does IPBES go from here? The MEP as the center of the whole process will meet for the first time already in March. Their list of tasks is long  - but the most prominent one will be to develop an initial work programme for 2014-2018. The member states on the other side are invited to submit requests, while United Nations bodies that are related to biodiversity and ecosystem services, are invited to submit inputs and suggestions. The stakeholders, headed by IUCN and ICSU, and other “relevant stakeholders” are invited to draft a stakeholder engagement strategy until the second plenary.  It will be interesting to see, whether IBS will have an interest in participating in this process. I’d say, let’s do it.

—Lars Opgenoorth 

IPBES-1 day three

Who has a stake in stakeholder involvement – do you?

It seems like stakeholder involvement in IPBES got a peptalk from almost any delegation in Bonn so far. But reality has not been so convincing – both from the side of the plenary as well as from our side as stakeholders. Luckily on both sides there were signs today that things might start to change.  

As mentioned yesterday, we had prepared some "text" we hoped could be included in the "Rules and Procedures" to strengthen our position and role in the future IPBES process. Unfortunately we were not given the chance to present it at the respective Contact Group meetings that were dealing with it as we were not given the floor – neither yesterday nor today. That is very unfortunate – to say the least. Of course the meetings are very intense already and involving additional ideas by stakeholders could complicate things. But listening to stakeholders only when it is convenient does not exactly resemble the peptalks and certainly not what we would call participation. 

Nevertheless, after this initial frustration we got some encouraging news today too, as our general opening statement seemingly led to the inclusion of two paragraphs that foster the draft of a stakeholder engagement strategy by the secretariat in cooperation with us. Furthermore, in the draft there was "text" that would allow stakeholders to participate in some of the "bread and butter" business of the IPBES – e.g. the right to suggest topics for the actual assessments as well as for commenting on the prioritization of the assessment themes by the MEP. This would be a crucial right since e.g. the IBS or even individual members (or of course any other stakeholder) could with their respective expert knowledge then propose topics or comment on the presented priority list. This is how we understand stakeholder involvement. 

Luckily also our own involvement [slowly] starts to improve as we intensify the coordination between present stakeholder groups – preparing drafts, coordinating the contacting of country delegations, and so on. As stakeholders are very diverse a next step would be to form a forum of the Societies representing the different involved scientific disciplines – so that we can really coordinate ourselves also during the intersessional stages and to get more of the potentially interested societies involved. Right now there seem to be only the IBS, the GFOe and the Society for Conservation Biology to be involved in Bonn (that is from the Science Societies). Some more have expressed their general interest – e.g. the European Ecological Federation. But in the end the question is - who has a stake in IPBES? Do we as the International Biogeography Society? Do you? 

—Lars Opgenoorth 

IPBES-1 day two

“Contact groups” and “Friends of the chair” – let the grinding begin
 

A faculty meeting is a dream come true of cooperation compared to the tough grinding that is and will be going on here the next days. As mentioned yesterdays IPBES is run in consensus mode and that means that every time opinions differ it takes quite some effort (and time) to come to an agreement if it can be reached at all – if not – put it in square brackets and deal with it some other time. Quite naturally the plenary is not the ideal place to reach agreements – it is a place of debate. This is where “Contact Groups” and “Friends of the Chair” set in – just two of a set of tools where smaller groups come together to actually work on a compromise. In the Contact Group format all delegations send someone to participate in the discussion. In the “Friends of the Chair” format, the chair asks specifically those groups to a meeting that are most outspoken in their disagreement. These tools came to use today for the continuation of defining the Rules and Procedures of IPBES. Unfortunately the topics that were being discussed are not really worth being repeated here while the points that actually would have been of great interest to us stakeholders as, e.g. the setup of the Multidisciplinary Expert Panel and the rules that will determine the rights of the observers, will be dealt with tomorrow due to a lack of time today. We had prepared statements on these issues and will present them tomorrow at the next round of the Contact Group if we get the chance. These positions should strengthen the rights of the stakeholders to participate for example in the nomination process for the Multidisciplinary Expert Panel (MEP). Right now, this can only be done by countries – but not for example from the different science organizations such as the IBS. A second issue is the general setup of the Multidisciplinary Panel. As mentioned yesterday, 5 positions are granted to each regional group. Thus there is no guarantee that the panel is actually balanced e.g. by disciplines. Stakeholders suggest that some additional seats should be installed that are reserved for important disciplines that are underrepresented.

For the interim panel this is not relevant anyway as candidates have already been nominated and probably also decided by now, as Canada indicated today. Unfortunately these most interesting discussions happen behind closed doors so we have to wait a couple more days to find out how the MEP will actually be made up. Unlike with the MEP some information today leaked regarding the future chair of IPBES. The person who talked about it was actually Robert Watson himself who mentioned that a compromise might be reached that the two nominees for the position of the chair will simply co-chair IPBES. This would certainly be a good solution. We’ll find out tomorrow if all the delegations think the same. 

—Lars Opgenoorth

IPBES-1 day one

IPBES is up and running – or the “Joy” of Rules and Procedures
 

Good things first. In a knowledgeable and spirited speech Achim Steiner, the UNEP executive director, opened IPBES-1. His evident joy was only topped by the interim Chair Alfred Apau Oteng Yeboah of Ghana who could not stop smiling about being called the first (interim) Chair of IPBES. Reason for his interim chairship is the fact that there are two candidates for the actual position: Zakri Abdul Hamid of Malaysia, nominated by the Asia-Pacific states and backed by the G77 and China. And Robert T. Watson of the UK, known for his long standing commitment within the IPCC which he chaired between 1997 and 2002. Watson was nominated by Western Europe and other States. As this is being written the candidates and the so far elected bureau members sit together to sort out the position of chair/co-chair. Let’s see whether they come to an agreement by the second session this afternoon. Up for election are also the 25 members of the MEP (Multidisciplinary Expert Panel). Each of the five UN regions is eligible to sent 5 experts to this panel that will be responsible for the scientific process of IPBES. An interesting curiosity in this election process is the fact that the Eastern European States so far have only nominated three persons for the 5 positions – all of whom come from Hungary. You start wondering where the wealth of qualified scientists or more generally “knowledge-holders” are from Eastern-Europe. So if anyone of our members is interested – maybe you should contact your country representative and put your hat in the ring.

Besides election matters members and observers had the chance to give general comments to the plenary today. As reported yesterday, the collected stakeholders agreed on an initial statement that was given to the plenary today and will be downloadable from the IPBES webpage. The stakeholder process that led to this statement was well organised by IUCN and ICSU – but starting the next days we will certainly discuss how we will organise ourselves in the future and who will have a mandate to represent the stakeholders in the future or if that is at all feasible.

Of course the statements of the member states also gave a first hint where IPBES is headed. While the members one after another announced that they highly value stakeholder involvement – you start wondering why on the issue of accepting stakeholders so many thought that a consensus procedure would be a good rule in this context. In essence that means that every member state can veto any particular stakeholder as an observer. Needless to say, that this would be a severe blow in the face of an open and transparent stakeholder process and thus for the acceptance of IPBES.

It seems generally very debatable whether consensus rule in a body that will oversee the production of scientific reports on the biodiversity crisis is a good idea but I guess it was not all that surprising that almost all members that spoke out on the topic today were strongly favouring consensus as the rule of vote to apply for IPBES. The power and irony of this set in when Bolivia also spoke out in strong support of a consensus rule right before they started reading their list of why, how and when they will oppose the current approach to IPBES. It for sure will make for some good drama in the coming days. Disregarding whether one agrees with Bolivia’s position on the IPBES or not – their statement sure has the potential to make some of the other member states second guess their position towards consensus rule.

—Lars Opgenoorth

IPBES-1 day zero

Stakeholders exchange their views and find common ground in preparation of IPBES-1

Under the chair of Anne Larigauderie of Diversitas International the IPBES-1 stakeholders today took center stage at the old German Parliament in preparation of the first plenary session that starts tomorrow. The roughly 150 of us coming from a diverse group of science organizations such as the IBS, indigenous groups, and NGOs such as Friends of the Earth, arrived only successively on a day that saw Frankfurt Airport close down due to ice and snow.

The stakeholders seemed somewhat biased by science organisations respectively scientists. Especially the absence of some of the major environmental NGOs was noticeable. This absence was interpreted by some that these NGOs are sceptical that the IPBES process will be independent enough and that it does not focus enough on the biodiversity crisis but rather on the ecosystem service part and human well being. It will certainly be a great challenge to balance these interests during the IPBES process.

The goal on day zero of IPBES-1 was to exchange ideas and to come to common positions for the up-coming week. In two roundtables the themes “Rules and Procedures” including the “Role of Observers”, and the IPBES “Initial Work Programme” were being discussed. We agreed that interest and engagement of all relevant stakeholders are key for the impact and legitimacy of IPBES. We will therefore try to convince the plenary to develop a strategy how stakeholders can be effectively included in the IPBES process. This strategy should get installed by the second plenary. One interesting suggestion included the setup of crowdsourcing tools to effectively empower a broad range of people to getting involved. Many participants stressed the importance to acknowledge the variety of relevant knowledge that exceeds knowledge provided by the science community. It will certainly be a major challenge to include the different groups of knowledge holders in the process and at the same time enable an effective science driven assessment procedure in this science-policy interface. Besides stakeholder involvement another point of concern were how the Multidisciplinary Expert Panel (MEP) will be set together in the future and how the roles of the MEP and the IPBES Bureau will be interpreted. While nominees for the Interim MEP (this will serve for 2 years) have already been named (list of nominees can be seen here: http://www.ipbes.net/plenary/mep-nominations.html ) and will be elected tomorrow, it is still unclear how the procedure of proposing the members will be handled in the future. As the MEP is the body that will be central in guiding the scientific aspects of the IPBES, we will strongly encourage the plenary to set up rules that allow all stakeholders to participate in the proposal procedure, and to make this process transparent. Regarding the roles – we are convinced that it should be the responsibility of the MEP alone to rank requests for assessment topics as part of its scientific and technical functions to ensure that this process will be science driven. Finally we agreed to ask the plenary meeting that the MEP will quickly start the process of developing an initial work programme during the intersessional phase so it can be voted on during the 2^nd plenary.

Tomorrow the country delegations of 105 member states of IPBES will move into the spot light, and after a very long preparatory process IPBES-1 will officially begin.

—Lars Opgenoorth

First Plenary Meeting of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES-1)

Stakeholders’ Day
Prior to the First Plenary Meeting of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and
Ecosystem Services (IPBES-1)SUNDAY 20 JANUARY 2013

World Conference Centre Bonn, Germany
Plenary meeting room

Annotated Agenda
This “Stakeholders’ Day” represents an opportunity for all non-governmental stakeholders interested in IPBES to informally exchange information and discuss issues related to IPBES. It is taking place prior to the 1st Plenary meeting of IPBES (IPBES-1) on Sunday, 20 January 2013. Building on previous such stakeholders’ consultations held prior to the two sessions that discussed modalities and institutional arrangements for IPBES (Nairobi 2011, and Panama 2012, respectively), this informal exchange will be facilitated by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the International Council for Science (ICSU), and co-convened by UNEP, UNESCO, FAO and UNDP.

Goals
The overall goal of this meeting is to provide a wide range of stakeholders with an opportunity to discuss their engagement in IPBES and in particular:
- To ensure a collective understanding and update on the IPBES process thus far;
- To discuss stakeholders engagement in IPBES, facilitating a collective understanding of the roles and responsibilities of stakeholders in IPBES activities and processes;
- To focus the exchange of views on the specific issue related to the admission of observers to the
platform that will be discussed and agreed at the first session of the Platform’s plenary; and
- To draw out elements for common plenary introductory statement on behalf of all stakeholders.

Documents Official Documents supporting the first session of the Platform’s plenary are available at
www.ipbes.net/plenary/ipbes-1. Participants are invited to pay particular attention to document IPBES/1/4 on ‘Draft Policy and Procedures for the Admission of Observers’, which will be discussed at this meeting.  Information regarding activities in support of IPBES which have been undertaken by a variety of stakeholders since the last intergovernmental meeting on IPBES in Panama will be posted at www.ipbes.net/resourcesunder the section on “Stakeholders”. All interested stakeholders are invited to send relevant information to the IPBES Interim Secretariat for sharing on the website.

The sessions will be co-chaired by Anne LARIGAUDERIE, Executive Director of DIVERSITAS and Head of the International Council for Science (ICSU) Delegation to IPBES and Cyrie  SENDASHONGA, Global Director Policy and Programme at the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

9:00-9:15 Welcoming Session
Opening remarks: IPBES interim Secretariat; co-conveners of IPBES (UNEP, UNESCO, FAO and
UNDP); and representative of the Government of Germany

9:15-10:45 Session 1: Update on IPBES
This session will inform participants about the on-going process to operationalize IPBES and the
intersessional process undertaken by the Platform since its establishment in April 2012. Keynotes
will be given by representatives of UNEP/ UNESCO,/FAO and/or UNDP, aiming and will cover:
- The outcome of the Panama meeting and the Panama Resolution;
- Activities undertaken during the intersessional process including:
o Nominations to IPBES Bureau and Multidisciplinary Expert Panel;
o Issues related to Rules and Procedures;
o Preparation of an initial work programme;
- The agenda for IPBES-1.
Participants will have the possibility to ask questions to the speakers.

10:45-11:00
Coffee Break

11:00-12:30
Session 2: Learning dialogues on IPBES process and activities
Participants will have the possibility to attend 3 roundtables and exchange in small groups on the
issues presented during IPBES-1. These exchanges in smaller groups will enable better understanding of the on-going processes and will bring clarity on the possible ways and means to contribute to IPBES activities. Discussions will be organized as follows:
Roundtable 1: Role of Observers in the Plenary
Facilitator: Cyrie SENDASHONGA
Roundtable 2: IPBES Rules and Procedures
Facilitator: Pierre COMMENVILLE
Roundtable 3: IPBES initial work programme
Facilitator: Anne LARIGAUDERIE

12:30-13:30 Lunch Break

13:30-15:00 Session 3: Contributing to IPBES
This session will provide an opportunity for a diverse set of stakeholders in IPBES to provide their
views on how they plan to interact with and/or make use of IPBES (maximum 8 interventions of 5
minutes each). These presentations will be followed by a general discussion on stakeholders' engagement in IPBES.

15:00-15:15 Coffee Break

15:15-16:45 Session 4: Outlining a common message to be conveyed to the Plenary
The session will begin by a general discussion on the admission of observers to IPBES Plenary, building on the exchange of views of session 2 (Official Document IPBES/1/4). The participants will then be invited to collectively craft a common message, including:
- A common statement on participation of Stakeholders in IPBES
- Comments on the draft policy and procedures for the admission of observers to the
Plenary of IPBES (document IPBES/1/4).

16:45-17:00 Closing Session
Closing remarks by co-chairs, including process proposed for informal regular stakeholders’
exchanges during IPBES-1.