Wednesday, July 8, 2026

2:30 PM - 4:00 PM

Room BE.0.17

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Details

The global decline in biodiversity has reinforced the need for robust indicators that track its changes to inform policy and management decisions. Essential Biodiversity Variables (EBVs) are a set of standardised biological measurements led by the Group on Earth Observations Biodiversity Observation Network (GEO BON) that harmonise observation data into data products supporting policy-relevant indicators to track and report biodiversity change across time, space, and levels of organisation. GEO BON has defined six EBV classes, among which the Genetic composition class uniquely captures genetic diversity, one of the three fundamental pillars of biological diversity, as recognised by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). Despite its central role in enabling species to adapt to changing environments, genetic diversity has long been overlooked in biodiversity monitoring and has only recently regained recognition as a critical component of biodiversity conservation. Although GEO BON acknowledges the growing potential of DNA-based data for estimating these EBVs, the standardised implementation of genomic tools and analysis workflows remains limited. Developing and adopting standardised genomic approaches is important to ensure that Genetic composition EBVs are estimated, interpreted, and presented in a harmonised and scalable manner. The scope of this workshop is to showcase how genomic data can be used to estimate genetic composition EBVs in a standardised way, and how these estimates can be translated into decision-relevant indicators. The session is structured in two parts: a guided framing segment followed by a panel discussion. The framing segment builds a shared conceptual language between genomics specialists and a broad conservation and biodiversity audience, introducing what genomic data is and why it matters, how sampling context, complementary data sources, and reference genomes underpin it, referencing initiatives such as the European Reference Genome Atlas (ERGA) and Biodiversity Genomics Europe Plus (BGE+), and how raw sequencing data becomes biodiversity-relevant information through descriptors such as effective population size, inbreeding, heterozygosity, and population structure. The panel discussion then brings together participants from research, agencies, and practice to explore how these metrics can be combined and simplified into a single, policy-relevant measure, and where current efforts still fall short of bridging genomic science and conservation policy implementation. The interactive format, with dedicated time for questions and reflection from participants with diverse backgrounds and career stages, aims to generate ideas on integrating genomic EBVs into biodiversity monitoring, reporting, and conservation policy across Europe.

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Organiser