Cross-cutting: Education, capacity building and awareness raising

Education and capacity building are necessary tools to promote NBS and ensure that NBS are taken from the idea stage to actual implementation.

can be promoted through engagement in NBS activities by schools and youth, pupils and students, and providing training programs for public administration personnel and contractors. Skills and knowledge on natural processes needs to be applied to ensure knowledge of quality and functioning of NBS.

through information campaigns, integration of NBS principles into strategies and plans, and introduction of support schemes are also among the ways to promote NBS. Awareness can increase the knowledge and care for nature that also promote support for NBS (Catalano, Campiotti & Baldacchini, 2021).

through well-known approaches such as courses, written and oral guidance and assistance programs as well as through direct NBS monitoring and evaluation can increase knowledge of the terms and principles connected to NBS. Knowledge and skills related to NBS can empower local communities to establish and maintain NBS.

is promoted as part of NBS by embedding feedback cycles of knowledge within the NBS processes. This way, evidence and knowledge created in the NBS planning can be brought in during the implementation process, knowledge from the implementation can be used in the monitoring phase, and so on. This means that building of awareness and competences continues throughout the implementation and use phase of NBS.

As the Nordics face multiple societal challenges - climate change, ecosystem degradation and natural disasters - there is a growing need for educated professionals with green skills who can seek and facilitate sustainable and functioning solutions. Working with NBS requires additional understanding of natural processes and ecosystems, and creating NBS without such considerations can lead to unintended effects or low-quality solutions. The need for increasing education on NBS in all education levels, supporting capacity-building, and awareness raising are emphasised among the findings and recommendations from previous Nordic NBS projects.

While it is well known that information alone does not motivate people to act on environmental and social issues, awareness and capacity building serve as important stepping stones toward action. NBS provide a solution-focused angle on environmental issues, with the potential to engage both professionals and civil society if presented in a constructive way. This can reduce lack of awareness of natural processes and change attitudes toward the use of conventional, grey solutions.

Many also point towards the need for a resurrection of people’s connection to nature at a societal level. Both in A-DVICE stakeholder consultations and other studies (e.g., Barkved et al., 2024; Welden et al., 2021), it is mentioned that awareness and engagement for NBS is connected to our general relationship with nature and creating positive visions for the future. This may also include changing common perceptions of how green spaces should look like and creating acceptance for “messy” nature in urban settings. In line with this thinking, many people are used to parks having tidy green lawns and straight paths with hard surfaces and when this is challenged it can create some resistance toward NBS. However, raising awareness of the benefits of for example, flower meadows and dead wood in forests, can create better understanding and acceptance (Bergesenstiftelsen, 2022). The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) highlights the need to think of nature’s value not only as something humans live from, but also living with, in and as nature (Pascual et al., 2022). NBS can contribute to reducing our alienation from nature and help us realise the interconnectedness of all ecosystems and species.