The Ecosystem Services Partnership aims to facilitate discussion and cooperation amongst those working in the field of ecosystem services, and its members especially. In order to do so, ESP has organised international conferences annually since 2008. As of 2015 ESP shifted to a bi-annual cycle for the World Conferences, with Regional conferences in the in between year.
In order to enable as many ecosystem services professionals around the globe to join and share knowledge, we shift the location of our international conferences to a different continent each year. In this way, we strengthen ties between professionals from all over the world, so best practices in the field of ecosystem services can be shared and ideally implemented elsewhere.
Are you interested in hosting an ESP world or regional conference? Please email [email protected]
Upcoming conferences
In the period 2020/2021/2022 we are organising a series of regional conferences. The regional conferences for Latin America and the Caribbean and Europe already took place. Here are the regional conferences still to come:
- 4th ESP Europe Conference, 10-14 October 2022, Heraklion, Crete, Greece
- ACES-ESP Conference, 12-15 December 2022, Washington, DC, USA
Suggestions for other regional conferences are welcome, especially from regions not mentioned above. If you are interested in organising an ESP regional conference in 2020/2021, you can express interest by filling out this form and sending it to [email protected].
4th ESP Europe Conference
10-14 October 2022, Heraklion, Crete, Greece
The next European conference will take place on the beatiful island of Crete! The theme of this conference is Ecosystem services empowering people and societies in times of crises.
The aim of this European ESP Conference is to highlight pathways for involving diverse societal groups (e.g., local stakeholders, public and private decision makers, NGOs, civil society organizations, students, businesses) in ES science, policy and practice. Besides the participation of researchers, practitioners, and policy makers, we further invite the general public, activist communities and civil society organizations to participate in the conference discussions. We will organize events and dedicated sessions in formats that are directed to the public (e.g., discussion forums, world cafes) and generate media outputs for ES specialists and broader audiences.
Keep an eye on the event website for updates.
ACES-ESP Conference
Posponed: 12-16 December 2022, Washington, DC, USA
The ACES conference focuses on linking state-of-the-art science, practice, and decision making by bringing together the ecosystem services community and decision makers from around the United States and the globe. The conference which was to take place in December 2020 is now postponed to 2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Read more about the conference on the official website.
ESP 10th World Conference
ESP hosted the 10th ESP World Conference in Hannover, Germany from 21-25 October 2019. The theme of the anniversary conference was 10 years advancing ecosystem services science, policy and practice for a sustainable future. We welcomed over 750 delegates from more than 65 countries worldwide, making this the biggest ESP conference to date. You can read more about ESP10 here. The proceedings are available online.
Previous Conferences
The first ever ESP conference was held in 2008, and since then many global and regional conferences have been organised by the partnership across. Find out more about the previous ESP conferences on this page.
You can find all conference pictures on ESP’s official Flickr page.