IPBES capacity building

Background and project goals

In order to make IPBES a really global knowledge platform as many countries as possible should become member states which provide knowledge and data for individual assessments, nominate scientists for assessment and review processes and involve civil society organizations into IPBES processes. Assessments so far showed that participation differs a lot between regions and that a higher quality could be achieved if more countries, scientists and organizations would participate, especially from regions which are underrepresented so far. One of the regions not so much involved in IPBES yet is South-East-Europe and Central-Asia. Main goal of the project was to enhance the capacity of governments, scientists and organizations in the target region South-East-Europe, Eastern Europe and Central-Asia to participate well informed in IPBES processes. These target groups are explicitly mentioned in the Stakeholder Engagement Strategy of IPBES.

Steps and implementation

The project organized three international capacity building workshops in the region which helped participants and their institutions to enhance the capacity to participate in IPBES processes like assessments, review processes and IPBES plenary meetings. The workshops covered the following aspects:

  • basic information about IPBES and its structures (e.g. Bureau, MEP, task forces, authors teams)
  • options for participation for all types of stakeholders
  • the IPBES work programme and the status of implementation
  • IPBES products
  • consultation processes which are under way
  • assessments which need input from the region

For these workshops, held in 2017, 2018 and 2019 capacity building material was be provided, including presentations and printed versions. Such materials were developed in English and Russian to be useful throughout the region. In the final project phase further capacity building needs were surveyed via a questionnaire. The results are available in a report.