Recommendations

Increase quality and quantity of population status assessment data of Arctic breeding waterbirds in the African-Eurasian Flyway

2.1 Support filling knowledge gaps and strengthening monitoring of Arctic waterbirds in the breeding grounds of the flyway, including implementing CBMP in cooperation with Wadden Sea Secretariat and AEWA.

2.2 Support improved population delineation of Arctic-breeding waders by collating Arctic breeding wader migration data (tracking, colour-marking, geolocator, ringing data, etc.) and presenting it on the CSN tool to improve flyway delineation data.

Mitigate effects of over-abundant white geese populations on shorebird habitat

2.1 Implement management actions resulting from study of white geese impacts in Canada (undertaken as part of AMBI Phase 1)

Harvest assessments and mitigation of unsustainable harvest of Arctic birds

2.1 Work with CBird to promote dialogue with authorities for management plans to combine the knowledge of status of hunted species between countries

2.2 Assess the population-level impact of seabird harvest in relation to other stressors

2.3 Conduct/update holistic harvest studies for circumpolar regions of interest using approaches tailored to regional contexts as appropriate

Secure intertidal and associated habitat for AMBI priority species at key staging and wintering sites in the Central and East Asian Flyways.

2.1 (Russia): Ensure improvement of protection of the Russian Far East coastal shorebird stopover sites, by providing information to support local and national decision making on key habitat identification and conservation, including consideration of the new Nature Park in Chukotka and prioritising recovery of closed protected area at Moroshechnaya river mouth in Kamchatka.

2.2 (United States): Gather better information on the abundance, distribution and habitat use of Dunlin and Bar-tailed Godwits at spring and fall staging sites in Alaska.

2.3 (China): Enhance protection of Jiangsu Coast ecosystem, especially the Rudong and Dongtai areas for Spoon-billed Sandpiper and other Arctic-breeding shorebirds considering World Heritage Site Nomination requirements.

2.4 (China): Enhance protection of the Luannan Coast especially Nanpu, Tangshan for Red Knot and other Arctic-breeding shorebirds.

2.5 (China): Enhance protection at Yalu Jiang, Liaoning for Bar-tailed Godwit, Dunlin, Great Knot and other Arctic shorebirds.

2.6 (China): Increase knowledge of key staging and wintering Arctic-breeding shorebirds sites in southern China (Guangdong, Guangxi and Fujian provinces) and improve conservation status of these sites.

2.7 (Republic of Korea): Support efforts to reverse declining trends of AMBI priority species (SBS, Great Knot, Dunlin and other) and improve habitat conservation along the flyway through sharing knowledge and international cooperative projects.

2.8 (Republic of Korea): Promote the importance of conserving Korea.

Incorporate resilience and adaptation of biodiversity to climate change into plans for development in the Arctic.

2.1. Prepare a reference guide for resource managers on sea-ice-associated biodiversity in times of rapid change (Life Linked to Ice).

2.2. Arctic Resilience Report.

2.3. Prepare three regional assessments with information to assist local decision-makers andstakeholders to develop adaptation tools and strategies to deal with climate change andother environmental stressors and produce an overall integrated report on adaptationactions (Adaptation Actions for a Changing Arctic (AACA) Part C).

2.4. Ensure accessibility of science results relevant to maintaining and increasing resilience ofbiodiversity to climate change through the ABDS and outreach.

2.5. Follow-up on the recommendations of the Life linked to Ice and related research.

Improve the capacity of the Arctic Council and its partners to make well-informed decisions on the needs, priorities, and options for preventing, eradicating, and controlling invasive alien species in the Arctic by improving the knowledge base.

Priority Action 2.1 Identify and assess:

a) the invasive alien species and pathways that pose the greatest risk of biological invasion into, within, and out of Arctic ecosystems;

b) the Arctic ecosystems, livelihoods, and cultural resources most vulnerable to biological invasion; and

c) the current and projected patterns and trends of introduction and impacts of invasive alien species in the Arctic.

Priority Action 2.2 Produce a series of topic-specific assessments of invasive alien species issues in the Arctic considering scientific, TLK, technical, environmental, economic, socio-cultural, legal, and institutional perspectives.

Priority Action 2.3 Improve the collection of information on the occurrence and impacts of Arctic invasive alien species, taking advantage of new technologies for early detection, and integrate this information into circumpolar, regional, and community-based observing networks, monitoring programs, (in particular the Circumpolar Biodiversity Monitoring Programme), and associated information systems such as (the Arctic Biodiversity Data Service).

Priority Action 2.4 Facilitate full, timely, and open sharing of data and other information relevant to Arctic invasive alien speciesprevention and management through the Arctic Biodiversity Data Service and the CAFF Web portal.

Implementation Action 2.1: Use tools such as risk analysis, horizon scanning, and site-based prioritization in identifying and assessing pathways that pose the greatest risk of biological invasions.

Implementation Action 2.2: Priorities for topic-specific assessments of invasive alien species include assessments of: the current status, projected trends, and impacts of alien species in the Arctic region; pathways of biological invasion; legal and institutional frameworks for addressing invasive alien species in the Arctic (including for border controls and importation); regional prevention and EDRR capacities; and the relationship between invasive alien species and indigenous peoples/local communities in the Arctic. These assessments should utilize both TLK and science, as appropriate, including the outputs of priority Action 2.1.

Implementation Action 2.3: The portal for information relevant to Arctic invasive alien species would include example scientific and technical information, best practices and tools, institutional and legal frameworks, and education/outreach materials. Utilize the Arctic Biodiversity Data Service (ABDS) and the CAFF website.

The CBMP is an adaptive, integrated monitoring program that provides timely information about status, trends, and changes in Arctic biodiversity and ecosystems.

Objective 2.1: Integrate lessons learned and advice for monitoring outlined in the SABRs into next steps of CBMP.

• Activity 1: After completion of major products such as SABRs, CBMP will initiate a scoping process to evaluate and prioritize FECs as indicators of change. This process will use lessons learned and SABR key findings and advice and result in a revised monitoring plan or long-term implementation plan.
• Activity 2: Review and consider lessons learned, when developing work plans.

Objective 2.2: Evaluate the effectiveness of existing and new methods and technologies as a tool to support biodiversity monitoring and assessment.

• Activity 1: Continue to improve and update Arctic Biodiversity Monitoring Plans based upon the SABR advice and lessons learned.
• Activity 2: Explore the use of remote sensing and e-DNA in CBMP activities.
• Activity 3: Consider impacts of stressors and drivers, including cumulative impacts, within reviews of the Arctic Biodiversity Monitoring Plans.•Activity 4: Consider how to understand the impact and effect of extreme events (e.g., wildfires, invasive species, extreme weather events etc.) on biodiversity, within revisions of Arctic Biodiversity Monitoring Plans.

Objective 2.3: Identify expert networks relevant for CBMP.

• Activity 1: Invite relevant networks to participate in the CBMP, including regional, Indigenous, and citizen science networks, e.g., eBird, iNaturalist.
• Activity 2: Enhance engagement of experts from Observer states and organisations.

Objective 2.4: Increase access to Arctic biodiversity data.

• Activity 1: Further develop interoperability of the ABDS with national and global data centres to facilitate access to existing and new data.
• Activity 2: Continue to work with Steering Groups, Expert Networks, and partners (such as the Arctic Spatial Data Infrastructure) to improve and consider issues of data access, visualization, metadata, comparison, and standardization.
• Activity 3: Develop a data management manual describing the flow of data from the field to CAFF assessments, including the harmonization of data across sites and scales.
• Activity 4: Increase the awareness of the ABDS amongst target audiences and other partners, including industry and other sectors.

Objective 2.5: Continue and strengthen cross-cutting activities among the CBMP Steering Groups.

• Activity 1: Hold bi-monthly telephone meetings between CBMP Co-leads and CBMP Steering Group Co-Chairs align and coordinate activities between CBMP Steering Groups. In-person meetings will also be held in conjunction with CAFF Board meetings when possible.
• Activity 2: Consider how to develop more targeted and integrated reporting
• Activity 3: Initiate steps to integrate work between the four groups.
• Activity 4: Design and develop a plan to include modelling and predictive science within CBMP, to be aligned with the 2023 CAFF Action Plan for Biodiversity.
• Activity 5: Conduct a landscape analysis of existing synergies within CBMP and other CAFF initiatives, as well as Arctic Council working groups, including the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program (AMAP) and the Protection of the Arctic Marine Environment (PAME), to be aligned with the 2023 Action Plan for Biodiversity.

Objective 2.6: Via expert networks, develop user manuals and test implementation of CBMP Arctic Biodiversity Monitoring Plans in the field.

• Activity 1: CBMP Terrestrial and Freshwater Groups will, together with the CAFF Secretariat and the CBMP Co-leads, continue to work on best practices for field trials on selected FECs and, as resources allow, produce site-specific user manuals at selected stations.
• Activity 2: CBMP Marine and Coastal Group will together with the CBMP co-leads consider how to replicate Activity 1 and/or implement these approaches into the Marine and Coastal Monitoring Plans.
• Activity 3: The CAFF Secretariat will, through the CAFF webpage and the ABDS, publish recommended methods and link to internationally agreed-upon standardized monitoring methods to implement CBMP monitoring at monitoring stations.

A number of additional options, some of which address fundamental issues and challenges to the application of the TEEB approach in the Arctic context. 1. Guidance, methods, tools and information to support policy

1.1. Raise awareness of the roles and value of ecosystem services among Arctic communities with the aim of empowering communities, grass roots organizations and local administrations for better discussions/negotiations with sub-national/federal governments and corporations on policy related to Arctic development.

1.2. Through collaborative processes, raise awareness of the ways that Arctic Indigenous Peoples value nature. For example, facilitate discussions between Indigenous Peoples and economists, aimed at informing ways to accommodate indigenous values in economic policies and practices.

1.3. Make the role of natural capital and ecosystem services explicit in relation to adaptation and adaptive capacity. This is best done through bringing results from this scoping study into, and working in collaboration with, Arctic Council initiatives, for example, bya) considering adaptation options for policy makers that include the non-monetary and economic aspects of biodiversity, through the Adaptation Actions for a ChangingArctic (AACA); and b) creating resilience indicators that would encompass ecosystem processes (building on the human development indicators) through the Arctic Resilience Report.

1.4. Make visible (in economies) the wider value of Arctic biodiversity conservation and sustainable biodiversity use schemes, and identify financing opportunities for such schemes that are based on recognizing ecosystem services.

1.5. Apply economic analysis with the goal of a) accommodating the multiple value systems underpinning mixed and livelihood economies in the Arctic, such as reindeer herding and community economies based, or partly based, on subsistence hunting, fishing and gathering; b) capturing Arctic social and ecological resilience in economic information and valuation; and c) facilitating investment in the insurance value of Arctic natural capital.

2. Knowledge base.

2.1. Complete and maintain the Arctic Ecosystem Services Inventory. A draft ecosystem services inventory was prepared as part of the scoping study (see Ecosystem services section above). The inventory is a start on a structured and synthesized literature review of Arctic ecosystem services, the ecosystems they are derived from, their associated benefits, status, trends, threats, uncertainty, knowledge gaps, and what work has been done on valuation. To be a useful source of synthesized information, and a basis for further information tools, the inventory requires further work. The inventory could a) be a ready resource for information and overviews of available information on ecosystem services and what is known about them in relation to beneficiaries, threats, trends and valuation, both to raise awareness and to provide an entry point for policy-related assessment work; b) serve as a metadata center and service through CAFF’s Arctic Biodiversity Data Service; and c) provide input to research and monitoring plans and agendas, and potentially also to industry monitoring and research planning

2.2. Take steps to capture or present new research results in ways that make them useful to ecosystem-services-based policy development. This could be awareness raising through research meetings of the need to make this connection, increased expert networking, such as through a community of practice on ecosystem services, and/or through changes to funding mechanisms for research.

2.3. Clearly identify knowledge gaps (both at the broad underpinning and methodological scale, and for specific geographic scales) and develop mechanisms to bring them into discussion of research agendas.

2.4. Facilitate and coordinate monitoring of the social and economic importance of ecosystems (through the Circumpolar Biodiversity Monitoring Program). 3. Synthesis, analysis and information products

3.1. Analyze linkages over scale, time and actors that affect when, where and to whom the costs and benefits of industrial development in the Arctic on biodiversity and ecosystems occur, considering also current and future use and spatial subsidies, to demonstrate the value and help frame the distributive impacts of decisions.

3.2. Prepare ecosystem services inventories with regular status reporting. Include interdisciplinary valuation of ecosystem services at the level of LMEs and national scales, but also initiate a regular review and assessment process at the pan-Arctic scale. Review and assessment would be in collaboration with existing Arctic Council processes, including the framework for assessment of biodiversity status and trends established through the CBMP.

3.3. Develop indicators to help describe the status of Arctic biodiversity and ecosystems. Include indicators that convey the proximity to potential thresholds or tipping points and attach confidence metrics to all indicators reflecting the level of knowledge and understanding. Development of such indicators needs to be done through co-production of knowledge based on a collaboration of Traditional Knowledge holders and scientists. (Indicator development is underway through the Circumpolar Biodiversity Monitoring Program.)

3.4. Develop resilience indicators that make explicit the role of natural capital and ecosystem services in building of adaptive capacity. These would have similar use for policy making but be more encompassing of ecosystem processes than human development indicators.

3.5. Develop and test tools to evaluate Arctic ecosystem services in local and sub-national EBM, marine spatial planning, land-use planning and management, and in co-management schemes where they can directly contribute to co-producing knowledge and adaptive governance.