The National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP) for National Parks and Marine Protected Areas - DigitAP Project

Innovation and technology in the service of biodiversity conservation

National Parks and Marine Protected Areas have been carrying out important monitoring work for years, that now provides the entire scientific community with a substantial knowledge base on biodiversity. However, monitoring activities, especially those focused on species and habitats, are characterized by heterogeneity, which prevents the collection of uniform, integrable data for the entire system of protected areas in the medium to long term. As part of the implementation of the NRRP, the specific Measure M2C4 Inv. 3.2, Digitization of National Parks and Marine Protected Areas (DigitAP), under the Mission “Ecological Transition and Green Revolution”, led by the Ministry of Environment and Energy Safety (MASE), aims to establish standardised and digitised procedures for the modernisation, efficiency, and effective operation of protected areas.

Specifically, the sub-investment related to Nature Conservation—monitoring pressures and threats to species, habitats, and climate change—focuses on enhancing technological tools to improve and expand knowledge on biodiversity and ecosystem services in national protected areas in a coordinated manner.

The technical and scientific coordination of the Measure is assigned to ISPRA.

The data from monitoring activities will be made available within the National Biodiversity Network (NNB) infrastructure.

Overall, the plan includes twelve specific interventions, nine of which are for providing services to monitor various components of biodiversity and the effects of climate change on Protected Areas, and three for supplying specific equipment for conducting monitoring activities.

An additional intervention is dedicated to the development of indicators for assessing the effects of climate anomalies on natural systems.