Urban Ecology: the green within the city 2023

Objectives

Context

The continuous urban development associated with the growth of the world population has become one of the most important challenges of the present time. Today, cities accommodate more than 54% of the world’s population, a proportion that is expected to increase to 70% by 2050. Trends in urbanization show that cities are becoming more complex and heterogeneous social-ecological systems, with a growing demand for natural resources mainly for infrastructure, housing, food, water, and energy. These, coupled with generalized environmental degradation and rapid social transformation, pose growing challenges that require an innovative and holistic approach of planning, managing and governing urban areas.

In this context, research is focusing on the role of the urban green infrastructure to deliver the ecosystem services necessary to city-dwellers' well-being. The urban green infrastructure is composed by the network of green spaces, such as public parks, urban forests, allotment gardens, green roofs, derelict lands, and street trees, among other. These green spaces are important for addressing urban sustainability, circularity, and resilience to global changes, as they play an important role to ensure the well-being of human populations.

Objectives

The goal of this course is to provide participants with current and practical knowledge on urban ecology, including its ecological and social aspects.  During the course we will view cities as social-ecological systems, analyse urbanization challenges for human and nature, understand the role of urban green infrastructure and nature-based solutions, study how urban agriculture can contribute to the delivery of ecosystem services, use ecological indicators to evaluate the status and trends of the environment, analyse people’s perceptions and knowledge regarding biodiversity and ecosystem services, and achieving circularity of resources. Additionally, participants will gain knowledge of concepts, methods, and tools through the presentation of key findings from recent projects carried out in multiple case studies in European cities.

Participants have to be present at 85% of the contact hours (this means that they can miss one half-day), and actively participate in all activities. 

This course can have a recognition of 6 ECTs for FCUL PhD students enrolling in it as part of their first doctoral year. These students need to deliver two reports after the course. For students only requiring 5 ECTs recognized in their specific PhD programmes the last 3.5 hours of the course are not mandatory, they need to deliver only the main report and the certificate will be on'Topics in Urban Ecology’. Such report(s) are also advised for other students requesting creditation of the course in their institutions.

Minimal formation of students: BSc - Bachelor’s degree in Natural / Environmental Sciences, Agricultural / Forestry / Environmental / Civil Engineering or Social Sciences with interest in nature-based solutions and urban green spaces management.