The essential role of essential variables in biodiversity and ecosystem services reporting within and across jurisdictions

HyeJin Kim, Bálint Czúcz, Patricia Balvanera, Simon Ferrier, Mike Gill, Jillian Campbell, Rebecca Chaplin-Kramer, Matthew Child, Gary Geller, Frank E. Muller-Karger, Henrique M. Pereira, Laetitia Navarro

Fragmented systems for monitoring and assessing biodiversity and ecosystem services limit countries’ ability to track progress across multilateral environmental agreements, coordinate actions, and thus meet agreed upon global commitment. This paper initiates to address this gap through integrated data-to-decision workflows for more synergistic implementation of global goals. We propose Essential Biodiversity Variables (EBVs) and Essential Ecosystem Service Variables (EESVs) as integrative tools to harmonize monitoring, indicator development, and reporting across frameworks such as the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework and the System of Environmental-Economic Accounts Ecosystem Accounting, while providing the foundational data for knowledge synthesis in the assessments of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. Through three case studies, we demonstrate the use of EBVs and EESVs in national assessments, modelling, and scenario analyses for strategic policy and spatial planning, using scalable and repeatable workflows from primary data to indicators. The paper highlights the value of an integrated use of science, policy, and data frameworks in implementing biodiversity conservation and sustainable development goals. We call for the global community to identify and agree upon minimum facets of biodiversity to monitor with national observation agencies to improve the rigour of data, models, and indicators.