ESPA Glossary

Evidence Challenge

An existing demand for new knowledge, which, if filled, would improve understanding of the links between ecosystem services and poverty alleviation. This will allow key stakeholders to progress policy and practice to improve the lives of the world’s poor.

Knowledge Gap

The specific question(s) which need to be answered to fulfil an evidence challenge.

Impact

In the context of ESPA, Impact refers to development impact, that is, the demonstrable effect of improving the lives of the world’s poor.

Impact Summary

All applicants to UK Research Council funding programmes (including ESPA) are required to include an Impact Summary of up to 4000 characters. This will outline who the potential beneficiaries of the research are, and how they will benefit.

Pathways to Impact

All applicants to UK Research Council funding programmes (including ESPA) are required to include a Pathways to Impact document of up to two sides of A4.

The document must outline what needs to happen during and after the lifetime of the research project, in order to ensure that maximum impact is achieved.

Capacity Strengthening/ Capacity Building

This refers to activities which are intended to improve the ability of individuals and institutions (often specifically in developing countries) to:

a) conduct ESPA research, and;

b) use ESPA knowledge to improve the lives of the poor.

Knowledge Intermediaries

These are individuals and institutions that are able to take the primary research produced by projects and translate that knowledge into new activities, policies and processes which will improve the lives of the poor.

Beneficiaries

The poor who are intended to benefit from ESPA research. It should be recognised that many new policies and activities will have ‘winners’ and ‘losers’. ESPA researchers are expected to identify who these people are, to specify how they will benefit and to outline what the project needs to do to ensure that will happen.

Ecosystems

A dynamic complex of plant, animal and microorganism communities and their non-living environment interacting as a functional unit. (1)

Ecosystem Services

Ecosystem Services are defined as the final point in the delivery chain from ecosystems that are used by people for material goods, such as food or fuel, or for non-material goods such as climate regulation, cultural benefits or flood prevention. Material and non-material goods have values which can be measured in monetary or in non-monetary terms (e.g. health status and cultural appreciation). The same goods may have different values depending on the context (place, time, person, etc.). The values that different social groups derive from ecosystems can influence how people treat or manage the ecosystem, which will affect their natural structure and processes. This component can, therefore, be thought of as a cycle with many kinds of feedback.

Natural ecosystem structures and processes underpin a variety of ecosystem functions and capabilities, such as primary production, water regulation and nutrient cycling that ultimately support ecosystem services, such as timber production or freshwater provision, from which people benefit.

Poverty

A lack of, or inability to achieve, a socially acceptable standard of living, or the possession of insufficient resources to meet basic needs. The meanings of 'socially acceptable’ or ‘basic’ are themselves open to debate depending on context and other factors.

A distinction can be made between absolute and relative poverty. Absolute poverty refers to the inability to meet what are thought to represent the absolute minimum requirements for human survival. Absolute poverty is often identified by those who fall below a certain poverty line. While $US1.25 per day is perhaps the most well-known poverty line, absolute poverty can also be measured against non-income aspects of deprivation (e.g. food insecurity, malnutrition, lack of access to health care, etc.).

Relative poverty considers the status of each individual or household in relation to the status of other individuals, households in the community, or other social groupings, taking into account the context in which it occurs. Relative poverty typically changes spatially and temporally. This means that measurements of relative poverty are therefore not necessarily comparable between locations or over time. The relative approach examines poverty in the context of inequality within a society, though they should not be conflated.

Political Economy

The existing governance, social structures, markets and institutions leading to the social, political and economic processes that ultimately shape the management of ecosystems.