March 2012: The Chairs’ Summary of an informal international expert workshop on “Policy support through relevant tools and methodologies” has been published. Workshop participants focused on the policy support function of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES).

The workshop, which took place from 7-9 December 2011, in Bonn, Germany. The German Federal Ministries for the Environment (BMU) and for Education and Research (BMBF), in consultation with the Government of India, invited government representatives, representatives of non‐governmental organizations (including scientific and other networks) and experts in this field to the workshop, as an informal contribution to the discussion.

According to the summary, discussions in plenary and break‐out groups focused on: the scope of the policy support function; potential tools and methods to address them; and the processes through which IPBES may tackle different topics. Participants in general supported the idea of a strong policy support function as one of the four main functions of IPBES agreed in the Busan Outcome.

Participants noted that the policy support function could address several aspects of the policy cycle, such as awareness raising, strategic policy development, policy implementation, evaluation and monitoring, and the improvment of access. They recognized that IPBES will provide global, sub‐regional and regional perspectives, and thus can only have a facilitative role or a catalyzing function of making tools widely available at smaller scales.

Finally, they agreed that IPBES should maintain flexibility in its processes, especially in covering its different functions and linking them according to the needs of each topic addressed. [Publication: Chairs’ Summary of the International Expert Workshop]