Erosion is a major threat to the ecosystemic services provided by soils, especially for nutrient cycling, provision of food, water purification, leading to significant on- and off-site effects that needs to be monitored, studied and prevented. EUROSION will tackle this issue by developing and demonstrating a dynamic soil erosion monitoring system able to continuously and precisely estimate soil erosion across spatial and temporal scales, considering water, wind and tillage effects in agricultural lands. This will be achieved with: (i) the creation of a robust multi-scale monitoring network composed of EUROSION partnership and representatives of complementary monitoring stakeholders, (ii) the elaboration of a monitoring scheme using harmonized monitoring methods allowing to collect up-to-date and reliable data, (iii) interrelated wind-water-tillage-related process-based erosion models capable of quantifying soil erosion from local to EU scale and across time and estimate the impact of management practices. These enhanced knowledge and innovative bricks will lead to the development of a user-friendly interactive and open-access platform for policymakers, researchers and monitoring stakeholders to visualize dynamic maps of erosion and conduct further research. Thus, EUROSION soil erosion monitoring system will deliver reliable estimates and validated indicators, on which the project will take stock to provide policymakers and agricultural land managers with recommendations on best management practices reducing soil erosion, supported by tailored cost-benefit analysis. EUROSION will also enable science-based trade-offs for the development and update of soil-related policies, including the new CAP. The project will run in close collaboration with local stakeholders, EU policymakers, and the JRC, and will be implemented in specific 12 Monitoring Nodes, representing European erosion hot spots and key agricultural areas.

Together with key stakeholders, NaturaConnect will co-develop knowledge, tools and capacity building programmes to support Member States in implementing an ecologically representative, resilient and well-connected trans-European nature network (TEN-N) that builds on the existing network of protected areas and Green and Blue Infrastructure. Through research, engagement and dissemination activities at the European scale and in a set of six case studies, we will elicit stakeholders’ visions and preferences about conservation objectives, tap into best practices in protected areas management and funding mechanisms, mobilize data and test the TEN-N spatial prioritization analyses and tools produced by NaturaConnect. This addresses two major obstacles identified by the EU Nature Legislation Fitness Check: lack of stakeholder awareness and cooperation, and insufficient knowledge and access to existing funding mechanisms. NaturaConnect will further address a third major obstacle, limited availability of knowledge on biodiversity distribution, drivers of change and conservation solutions. To address this, NaturaConnect brings together a consortium of the top European scientists, policy experts and NGOs to produce and mobilize relevant data and knowledge. This includes refining and applying state-of-the-art models on biodiversity, ecosystem services and environmental change across Europe and under current and future climate and land-use. Equipped with improved data, knowledge, models and spatial planning methods we will identify gaps in protected area coverage, connectivity and resilience under climate and land-use change. We will further develop scenarios for expanding protected areas, establish ecological corridors and other areas of connectivity to address these gaps, thereby offering a blue-print for realizing TEN-N. NaturaConnect will further provide knowledge and decision support for policy, financing and implementation of TEN-N at all relevant scales.

This FPA provides comprehensive programming and support for the European Commission’s Mission of 100 Climate-neutral and Smart Cities by 2030. It builds on the NetZeroCities (NZC) project, coordinated by CKIC. Combined, these two initiatives set out actions as follows: (a) Create and operate a Cities Mission Platform as a ‘one-stop-shop’ to access the expertise, capabilities, services, and solutions necessary to achieve climate neutrality. This Platform will provide tailored and intensive support to cities participating in the Mission and will ensure open access to the knowledge and resources of the Platform. (b) Help all Mission Cities with the co-creation and use of Climate City Contracts (CCC) to enable an ambitious pursuit of the goal of climate neutrality by 2030. This FPA expressly seeks to ensure all Mission Cities are supported and builds directly on the initial scope of NZC. In addition, support will be offered to additional cities seeking to follow closely the Mission. (c) Assist Mission cities in the development of tailor-made investment plans, project preparation and finance for the cities participating in the Mission; (d) Deliver substantial resources to Mission cities for ongoing research and innovation activities critical to achieving climate neutrality by 2030. This support will be in the form of ‘pilot’ funding to test and demonstrate actions needed to deliver climate neutral outcomes. This pilot activity will work together with the Platform and CCC processes in the cities, operationalizing emerging knowledge and insights about how cities can achieve the Mission objectives; and (e) Ensure ongoing monitoring and evaluation of cities in their progress toward climate neutrality and deploy peer-based learning to ensure full appropriability of the result from the Mission. The FPA periods extends through 2027 and provides for two planned Specific Grant Agreement (SGA) phases, where a precise plan, targets and metrics will be established.

NetworkNature+ will continue NetworkNature’s legacy as a ‘network of networks’ and expand it to engage new audiences in addressing the societal challenges outlined by the EU. It will maintain and enhance the established evidence/demand/policy-driven multi-stakeholder platform for NBS, strengthening partnerships and fostering new relationships around a clear strategic framework for action, underpinned by an updated EU Research & Innovation NBS Roadmap and complementary analysis of policy opportunities for integrating NBS at EU, Member State, regional and local level in view of EU 2030 policy targets and EU Missions. NetworkNature+ will provide scientific NBS insights across selected policy priorities and different European and international contexts. This will guide our work around dialogue, stakeholder interactions, knowledge sharing and awareness raising, resulting in products, standards and advisory services that support the growing NBS community of innovators, practitioners and developers. A targeted training and capacity building programme will promote a step change from siloed, project-based thinking towards an integrated, systemic and stakeholder-led approach to NBS planning, design and investment, while leveraging the role of ecosystems as critical infrastructure that support regenerative economic activities and help reduce biodiversity loss. We will enable regional and Europe-wide transdisciplinary collaboration to answer identified R&I needs for NBS via knowledge exchange between EU-funded NBS R&I projects and stakeholders, together with skills development and capacity building for target groups from science, policy, business and society. International collaboration with key strategic partners (e.g. UNCBD, IPBES, IPCC, UNFCCC, UNEP, UNDRR) and selected regions will enable European expertise to inform the global NBS discourse, contributing to the EC’s vision of “a stronger Europe in the world” and supporting new investments for NBS.

ForestNavigator aims at assessing the climate mitigation potential of European forests and forest-based sectors through modelling of policy pathways, consistent with the best standards of LULUCF reporting, and informing the public authorities on the most suitable approach to forest policy and bioeconomy. With a primarily European scope, ForestNavigator zooms into carefully selected EU Member States to enhance the consistency of the EU and national pathways, but the project also zooms out towards the global scale, and selected key EU trading partners, accounting for extra-EU future drivers and potential leakage effects. The project will rely on a newly developed integrated policy modelling framework for the EU forests and forest bioeconomy covering i) all relevant mitigation strategies from forest management to energy and material substitution, ii) climate change impacts, adaptation, and natural disturbances, iii) biophysical climate feedbacks, iv) systematically accounting for impacts on biodiversity, forest ecosystem services, and other forest functions, incl. jobs and green growth. To increase the accessibility of the models and pathways assessments, their understanding and transparency, a novel decision-making platform will be established consisting of the web-based ForestNavigator Portal, and a community of policy-makers, national authorities, and modelers, the Forest Policy Modelling Forum. To reach its ambitious objectives, ForestNavigator will i) harmonize, integrate and continuously update existing datasets by, including national inventories with new remote sensing data and models ii) start from complex forest and climate models and through emulators build them into operational policy modelling tools, iii) integrate biophysical and socio-economic information, iv) consider EU forests and forest bioeconomy in the broader context of other land use and economic sectors, v) rely on input from policy makers and other stakeholders.