Monitoring Ecosystem Recovery at the Landscape Scale

Yvonne Edwards, a Chartered Forester and Chartered Ecologist working for the University of Edinburgh developing the innovative Forest and Peatland Programme.  The Programme is creating woodland and restoring peatland both on owned land and with partners across Scotland and will be developing a monitoring, reporting and verification system on metrics that will include carbon, biodiversity and social benefits.  This data and sites will be long term learning and research resources. As the Data Manager for the Native Woodland Survey of Scotland, Yvonne developed this national resource of validated ecological data, that was the first full record of Scotland’s Native Woodlands. In addition she has worked on the restoration of vacant and derelict land sites to woodland, on habitat and species conservation and led a team planning and managing both new and existing forests. 

Prof Nathalie Pettorelli is a conservation biology professor at ZSL’s Institute of Zoology where she began as a Postdoctoral Research Assistant in 2006. She has authored/co-authored/co-edited 6 books and authored/co-authored over 220 peer-reviewed scientific publications on topics that include climate change ecology, biodiversity monitoring, remote sensing as well as environmental and wildlife management. Nathalie is currently a member of Defra’s Biodiversity Expert Committee, the Office for Environmental Protection College of Experts and RSPB’s Conservation Advisory Committee; she also co-chairs the BES' rewilding specialist interest group. She is the Editor in Chief of Remote Sensing in Ecology and Conservation, a high impact peer reviewed journal publishing multidisciplinary research from the interface between remote sensing science and ecology and conservation. 

Dr Ruth Waters is Director of Evidence in Natural England where she oversees the monitoring and science strategy for the organisation.  She is a strong advocate for inter-disciplinary application of science in real-world settings for nature recovery.  Ruth has worked on a wide range of projects and has broad multi-disciplinary experience including working with economists, social scientists, and ecologists to seek better ways of understanding, valuing and managing our natural environment for people and nature. Ruth was the lead natural scientist in the team supporting Prof Sir Partha Dasgupta on the independent review of The Economics of Biodiversity. She leads the team delivering the terrestrial Natural Capital Ecosystem Assessment for England. 

Dr Hannah Rudman is Business Development Director at Highlands Rewilding, a company mass-ownership company enabling nature recovery and community prosperity through rewilding. She is also Senior Research Fellow at the James Hutton Institute, directing applied research in nature tech and digital measurement, reporting and verification. Hannah is Co-Chair of the Scottish Forum on Natural Capital. Previously Hannah founded and developed two environmental tech start-ups, and designed multi-national digital transformation programmes, eventually selling her frameworks to Leidos, a global technology services company. She is elected Fellow of the British Computer Society.