INTERCEDE

Forests are crucial for climate mitigation, biodiversity protection, water flow regulation, recreational, cultural and health services – and many other forest ecosystem services (FES). Yet, as a key challenge, Europe’s forests critically undershoot their potential to deliver FES at present. Climate change will affect future FES supply. Societal demand for FES will be complex, and highly dynamic. Some FES economic values are ill explored.

Facing these challenges, INTERCEDE will project theory-informed, evidence-based scenarios to better match future FES supply and demand from Europe’s forests. It will foster the development of Market-Based Instruments (MBI), which can be key in improving tailored incentives and incomes for forest owners to manage their forest for socially optimal FES provision, as recognized in the EU Forest Strategy. MBI can thus help aligning FES supply with multidimensional demand.

Key activities 

1. INTERCEDE will comprehensively map and evaluate Europe’s current MBI landscape, adding new rigorous impact evaluations of Payments for Environmental Services (PES) schemes, while also assessing the EU’s Rural Development Programme (RDP) investments from a PES angle. 
2. Based on this analysis, the project will develop effective, adaptable and scalable MBI policies. 
3. This can only be achieved by systematically connecting research to policy and practice, creating a multi-actor aligned Transdisciplinary Forum as key interface. 
4. Mid-way through the project, the consortium will set up an Accelerator Service for (new or pre-existing) PES and MBI schemes, piloting new designs and MBI business models to boost the development, outcomes and impacts of targeted interventions.

EFI’s leads a task focused on rigorous environmental impact assessment of some selected PES-like instruments. In addition, EFI contributes to systematically mapping market-based instruments for Forest Ecosystem Services in Europe, to investigating the effectiveness of RDP/CAP-related-measures, and to developing overall guidelines for implementing market-based instruments. EFI also leads INTERCEDE dissemination, exploitation and communication activities, developing tools and products, showcasing the wider benefits of Market-Based Instruments, and using tailored strategies to reach key project stakeholders and a broader target audience of interest to the project.

The INTERCEDE project consortium brings together small and medium-sized enterprises assisting forest owners in FES management practices, organisations representing landowners and environmental interests, and researchers who excel in modelling and valuing FES, in the economics of instrument design, and in governance and policy analysis. INTERCEDE Is coordinated by the University of Copenhagen.