CIEEM 2024 Autumn Conference: Restoring Forwards: Best Practices for Resilient Nature Restoration

In partnership with the Society for Ecological Restoration 

We are delighted to be working in partnership with the Society for Ecological Restoration (SER), to deliver this year’s autumn conference as a fully hybrid event with online attendance possible for both CIEEM and SER members. SER has for more than three decades given voice to the field of ecological restoration and provided leadership in all aspects of its development. With over 5,000 members in more than 100 countries, SER foster the exchange of knowledge and expertise among restoration practitioners and scientists from diverse disciplines and backgrounds. SER actively promotes best practices and effective restoration policy around the world - partnering with SER helps to kickstart opportunities for CIEEM and SER members to learn from each other and we are pleased to be able to offer attendance to SER members at our CIEEM member rate. 



Confirmed speakers include: 








    

    
George Gann CERP. George has been a lead figure in the development of the SER International Standards and since 2019, has served as SER’s International Policy Lead. In collaboration with his duties as the Acting Director and Chief Conservation Strategist for the Institute for Regional Conservation (IRC), George is leading SER’s international policy program to advance the science, practice and policy of ecological restoration. He has spent the last 40 years working on the conservation of rare plants, the restoration of ecosystems and a host of other conservation and sustainability issues. 
    



 



    

    
Diana Pound CEnv, FCIEEM. Diana is a solutionist and internationally known expert in participation. She set up Dialogue Matters in 2000 to enable better quality decisions related to the environment applying evidence-based participation practice. Her work includes placed based work, national dialogue on contentious issues, through to international dialogue about water, climate, ocean management and food security. So far Diana has led over 130 dialogue processes, trained 2500 people, and worked in 28 countries. She’s led commissioned research into participation and empowerment and advised organisations including governments in the UK and elsewhere and international bodies such as RAMSAR, OSPAR, UNFCCC and IUCN.  She’s led Dialogue Matters to win multiple best practice awards including CIEEM’s highly prestigious Tony Bradshaw Award for ‘outstanding best practice’. In 2019, Diana was given the IUCN, CEC Award for Excellence in Europe. She was also awarded Highly Commended (second) in SocEnv’s prestigious UK Environmental Professional of the Year. Diana will share learning from current research she is carrying out to advise Natural England, the Environment Agency and Defra on the role of landscape governance and justice in positive and resilient landscape futures.  
    



 



    

    
Professor Steve Ormerod CEcol, FCIEEM, FLSW, FRSB. A former President of CIEEM, Steve is Professor of Ecology at Cardiff University and has held many roles with learned societies, research organisations, environmental NGOs and statutory bodies including his current position as Deputy Chair of Natural Resources Wales. In his talk Recovery and resilience or regression and relapse? The state of Britain's streams and rivers, Steve will offer analyses of long-term trends in the ecological quality of stream and rivers affected by pressures at different scales from global, national and more local stressors. 
    



 



    

    
Chitisha Gunnoo is a Doctoral candidate at the University of Mauritius. Through a series of case studies and participatory action research, Chitisha will highlight the importance of fostering trust, respect, and mutual understanding among diverse stakeholders, as well as the transformative potential of community-driven restoration projects that harness local ecological expertise and traditional conservation practices in Small Island Developing States (SIDS). 
    



 



    

    
Dr Jake Robinson is a microbial and restoration ecologist working at Flinders University, South Australia. He gained a PhD in microbial ecology and nature-based solutions from the University of Sheffield, UK. His main research focus is on the environment-microbiome-health axis and developing innovative tools and strategies to restore and conserve nature. Jake is a member of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) think tank, Resilience Frontiers. He has published two popular science books including Invisible Friends: How Microbes Shape Our Lives and the World Around Us, and Treewilding: Our Past, Present and Future Relationship with Forests. 
    





 



    

    
Ivan de Klee is Head of Natural Capital at nature restoration company Nattergal, and before joining Nattergal he was Head of Natural Capital at the Knepp Estate. His presentation will focus on process-led nature recovery as defined through reinstating processes, not setting targets, and will ask how we can measure success in a system that is led by nature and has no fixed end point. Further, how can we use binary metrics to predict biodiversity uplift in a system where we don’t manage for target habitats or species? Ivan will outline how Nattergal deliver gold standard process-led nature restoration, how to use nature-tech and academic partnerships to measure success, and how to use ‘management-centric’ tools such as the Statutory Defra Metric in a minimum intervention system to sell ecosystem services on nature recovery projects. 
    



 



    

    
Dr Jo Treweek, CEnv, MCIEEM has a personal interest in farming and the environment, dating back to her degree in agriculture and forestry, early employment as a shepherd, and her doctorate exploring the use of sheep grazing to diversify lowland neutral grasslands. As a researcher with the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, she focused on habitat restoration and use of ecological data in development planning and environmental assessment. Now with eCountability, she is helping farmers and land managers in the UK to engage in nature recovery and benefit from rebuilding biodiversity. Jo will share initial results from the Wendling Beck Environment Project in Norfolk, a 700-ha habitat restoration project established by an alliance of landowners and environmental stakeholders interested in nature recovery. WBEP has initiated habitat restoration for a small number of BNG agreements and further habitat creation and enhancement has been initiated in anticipation of further such agreements in future. WBEP is also an Environmental Land Management (ELM) Test and Trial Project and is likely to enter some land into ELM. Systematic testing of techniques at WBEP is being combined with demonstrations for farmers who are also being offered opportunities to trial various methods.