Peatland Perspectives - restoring for tomorrow

8.30 - 9.00 Reception

Coffee & tea

9.00 - 11.15 Sessions & information market

• Peatland restoration in the border region
• Bridging through experimentation
• To measure is to know?
• Peatland restoration in regional planning processes 

10.00 - 10.15 Break and changeover

Information market open continuously

11.15 – 13.00: Information market & lunch

• Information market
• Pitch podium

13.00 - 15.45 Sessions & information market

• Learning experiences
• Less is more
• The value and costs of nature (restoration)
• To be announced

14.30 - 14.45 Break and changeover

Information market open continuously

15.45 - 16.00 Break

16.00 - 17.30 Plenary programme

• Restoring European nature together with LIFE
• Q&A
• Symposium close

Several leading peatland restoration projects have been and are being carried out in the German-Dutch border region. Project managers and technical managers discuss their approaches, interventions, challenges and lessons. In this session, the focus is on practice. Experiences and insights will be discussed using a large number of examples.

Nature and agriculture? Awkward bedfellows, right? Experiments reveal otherwise. This session will examine various experimental measures for (accelerating) peatland restoration. What do trials with peat moss cultivation, paludiculture and other innovative techniques teach us, now and for the future? And do they offer other perspectives? 

Researchers monitor a multitude of factors: species, water levels and greenhouse gases. What do the figures tell us? And what do they obscure? This session focuses on the results of collaborations between research institutes and nature conservation bodies, such as how peatland habitats can be improved and protected through monitoring and the evaluation of on-site greenhouse gas capture.

Peatland restoration projects have a significant impact, not least on the immediate surroundings. How do you conduct the dialogue and build support? In this session, consultation managers share experiences – both successful and unsuccessful – with finding common ground for the ecological task amongst farmers, local residents, recreational users of the area and nature lovers. Could an agricultural perspective offer more potential?

Nature education and nature experience reinforces people’s relationship with the natural world. But how do you interest people to learn and experience? This session focuses on learning techniques, methods and concepts that are successful in the field of environmental education and education for sustainable development, for different target groups. It also includes developments in the regular higher education system, such as 'environment-inclusive entrepreneurship' in agricultural courses.

Working in fragile nature requires minimising disturbance and emissions. This requires innovation and 'thinking around'. In the Fochteloërveen, a two-kilometre-long electric conveyor belt transports sand and loam into the raised bog. Combined with hydrogen tractors and electric excavators, this reduces emissions by 85%. And in other areas, too, low-emission work is increasingly being carried out. In this session, implementers and inventors list the latest developments.

Attributing an economic value to nature changes the balance of interests. But how do you quantify the climate benefits of healthy peatlands? And how can restoration measures be funded? In this session, experts with practical experience describe the ‘world of valuable ecosystem services’ using example projects. They also show how estimating the economic value of nature can influence decision-making.

Under development