Butterfly

The Butterfly project has the full title "Mainstreaming pollinator stewardship in view of cascading ecological, societal and economic impacts of pollinator decline" and is a broad international and transdisciplinary consortium for pollinator stewardship in all sectors of the economy. 

The consortium consists of 24 partners (external link) and is coordinated by the Centre for the Study of the Sciences and the Humanities at the University of Bergen. It will also focus on the human dimensions of the pollinator decline and work to boost the engagement of the social sciences and the humanities in policy-relevant research.

For more information and continuous updates, see the project's official website. (external link)

Background

Amid steep pollinator declines, the character and full magnitude of threats of pollinator loss to human well-being are poorly known and society’s dependency on healthy plant-pollinator networks are inadequately understood. The cascading impacts (“butterfly effects“) of pollinator loss can be far reaching. Major supply chains for food and nutrients, bio-materials, bio-energy crops, medicine, and cosmetics all critically depend on pollinators.

Butterfly will address these important knowledge gaps and will co-create and test tools for foresight and practices for proactive restoration of pollinator habitats in a network of living labs across Europe and 3 overseas sites.

Our mission

Our goal is to make a real difference to the way our society operates. We want to stop and reverse the decline of pollinators. We want to see a major shift in our approach to nature, the way we farm, community practices, policies, economies, households and attitudes. 

Butterfly’s impact should be significant positive changes in biodiversity, pollinator-dependent farming practices and related businesses, community practices, policies, economy, private households and mindsets, across and beyond Europe. 

Four pathways will lead to this goal: 

1) Tools for actionable pollinator knowledge, engagement and decision support

2) Living Labs as long-term test beds for evidence-based solutions and policy interventions 

3) Education of stakeholders at all levels

4) Guidance and science-policy interaction for policy coordination, synchronisation and coherence.

Butterfly - what's in a name?

The butterfly is a metaphorical pollinator. It is a delicate and vulnerable creature, and a universal symbol of beauty. It represents the vital role that pollinators play in making our landscapes more beautiful and liveable places. 

Benjamin Franklin’s poetic early warning of the cascading effects by which entire Kingdoms depend on small things, is now known as the Butterfly Effect. The same is true of small restoration efforts: a single, well-chosen action can have a huge impact on pollinator populations. The metamorphosis from caterpillar to butterfly symbolises the project’s transformative approach, which is essential to restoring biodiversity. This is the project’s ability to change things for the better.

Living labs

A lot of the project's work will be done in a network of Living Labs (external link), which will serve as breeding places for multi-actor co-creation of knowledge and sustainable solutions, paving the way to pollinator stewardship in all sectors.

A Living Lab is defined as an "open innovation ecosystem in real-life environments using interactive feedback processes throughout a lifecycle approach of an innovation to create sustainable impacts.

Butterfly's Living Labs will assess how five key biomass supply chains (food/micronutrients, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, biomaterials, biomass energy) critically depend on pollination. Together with all actors involved in each supply chain, the Living Labs will co-create and test pollinator restoration options that increase the resilience of these supply chains.

Facts about Butterfly

• The budget is 7 million euro grant, of which 904 000 euro go to UiB
• Butterfly is coordinated by the University of Bergen and has 24 partners from 13 countries & three overseas territories: Norway, Germany, France, Greece, Denmark, Ireland, Finland, the Netherlands, Poland, Italy, Spain, Belgium, the UK, Greenland, Curaçao and Martinique
• The project will create six Living Labs in Spain, the Netherlands, Denmark, France, Norway and Italy