CIBIO-InBIO RESEARCHER PARTICIPATED IN AN EXPERT WORKSHOP OF THE EUROPEAN ENVIRONMENT AGENCY

In the workshop titled “Review of the JRC/EEA EU-level HNV Farmland methodology” CIBIO-InBIO researcher Ângela Lomba contributed to review specific methodological approaches to improve the Joint Research Centre (JRC)/ European Environment Agency (EEA) approach for estimating the distribution of High Nature Value (HNV) farmland at European Union (EU) level.

This workshop is expected to result in an improved updated map of High Nature Value farmland in the EU, and on a refinement of the existing methodological approach, to be published as an EEA report.

The utilization of national level data and case studies, comparable to the EU approach, for improving selection rules per environmental zone or individual countries; the potential of EU level data sets on agricultural land use intensity for refining rules for targeting EU HNV farmland; opportunities to enhance HNV farmland assessments with satellite data; and the advances recently made towards the production of an updated HNV farmlands map to be available in the near future, were among the issues discussed.

The event joined participants from European Union level organisations – namely the European Environment Agency, EU Joint Research Centre, the European Topic Centre on Urban, Land and Soil Systems, and associated Remote Sensing leader GISAT (Czech Republic)-, experts from the Institute for European Environmental Policy and country level experts (from Netherlands, Czech Republic, Germany, Portugal).