Understanding and tackling the decline of insects

Expected Outcome:

Project results are expected to contribute to all of the following expected outcomes:

• researchers better understand the status and population trends of insect species and the drivers of their decline;
• competent authorities in charge of biodiversity policies at all levels are capable of taking informed decisions, based on better understanding and valuation of socioeconomic benefits and ecological importance of insects, including for climate action;
• society and relevant land managers are better informed and equipped to tackle the drivers of the decline of insects.

Scope:

Insects play a vital role contributing to ecosystem functions in addition to pollination, such as decomposition and nutrient cycles, soil formation (including carbon sequestration) and pest control, control functions essential for maintaining ecosystem complexity, and are an indispensable part of the food chain. Those functions are key for climate change mitigation and allow the provision of ecosystem services which have economic benefits and support human well-being. Additionally, insects play a key role in other socioeconomic areas such as medical and pharmaceutical applications (e.g. antimicrobial peptides), forensic science or biotechnology.

The dramatic decline of insects, estimated around 75% in the last three decades, is raising increasing concern among scientists and in the public, since it could have far-reaching implications. In order to be able to tackle this decline, there is a need to improve our understanding of the drivers of loss and how they interplay. A better knowledge of insects themselves is necessary.

With targets 4 and 5 of the EU biodiversity strategy for 2030, the EU took, among others, the commitment that by 2030 habitats and species show no deterioration in conservation trend and status, at least 30% reach favourable conservation status or at least show a positive trend, and that the decline of pollinators is reversed. According to the EU Nature Restoration Regulation, Member States shall put in place appropriate and effective measures to improve pollinator diversity and reverse the decline of pollinators by 2030. This is reflected in target 4 of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. The European Climate Law requires Member States to adopt and implement national adaptation strategies and plans in which they should promote Nature-based Solutions and ecosystem-based adaptation. These policies and legislations have reached the implementation stage in the EU and worldwide.

Successful proposals are expected to:

• improve understanding and identification of insects’ diversity, including through genomic approaches;
• focus on less known insect groups. In particular a solid knowledge has already been generated regarding pollination and pollinating insects through past and ongoing projects, therefore they are not expected to be subject to new research under this topic;
• assess the status and trends of insects and analyse multiple drivers affecting them, as well as the ecosystem services that insects provide, at different spatial scales. A comprehensive integrative taxonomy approach should be adopted, incorporating a multidisciplinary framework, including ecology and ecotoxicology, and integrating methods that address the diverse needs of insects across their entire lifecycle, ensuring the identification of essential habitat resources at each stage of development. To assess the status and trends of insects and the effectiveness of strategies, proposals should develop and test approaches for long-term monitoring schemes for insects, possibly building on existing national or EU biodiversity monitoring schemes and pilots developed by Biodiversa+;
• devise, test and promote effective strategies to mitigate the major drivers of insects’ decline. Analyse the ecosystem functions underpinned by insects and undertake qualitative and quantitative valuation of ecosystem services emanating from those functions;
• explore how to implement ecosystem protection and restoration practises and actions that are beneficial for insects.

Concrete efforts should be made to ensure that the data produced in the context of the funded project is FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Re-usable), exploring workflows that can provide “FAIR-by-design” data, i.e., data that is FAIR from its generation. Possibilities offered by the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) and by relevant European research infrastructures including the Catalogue of Life (COL), DiSSCo, LifeWatch ERIC, EMBRC, eLTER and MIRRI-ERIC^[1] to store and give access to research data could be considered where relevant.

Proposals should foresee appropriate resources to ensure close cooperation with the EC Knowledge Centre for Biodiversity (KCBD) and its Science Service and with other projects that work on understanding drivers of biodiversity decline.

International cooperation is encouraged.

[1] And any other relevant research infrastructure prioritised by the European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI). The catalogue of European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures (ESFRI) research infrastructures portfolio can be browsed from ESFRI website https://ri-portfolio.esfri.eu/