Methodology for Part 2: Development of composite indicators (led by UNIVLEEDS)

The indicators developed in Part 1 are being developed in a bottom-up process through consultation with end users in focus groups. The top-down indicators which are being developed in Part 2 differ in two ways. First, they have been derived from a scientific understanding of the processes of desertification based on theoretical and empirical research over the last decade. Second, and as a direct consequence of our scientific understanding, they provide two kinds of composite indicators for desertification risk, combining simple factors to reflect their interactions and the range of conditions under which each is important. The ESAIS in Work Package 2.1 is primarily based on prior empirical and field-based research, much of it carried out in the target areas in the MEDALUS projects. The results of this work led to the development of a prototype system for the Lesvos and Agri areas, and this is now being formally extended as a generic tool. The method identifies relevant physical factors, and combines them to provide a locally relevant optimal indicator of desertification risk. The RDI in Work Package 2.2 is based on a simplified state-of-the art coarse scale erosion model, also originally proposed in the MEDALUS projects, and now undergoing concurrent scientific development in the EU PESERA project. This provides an explicit physical basis for combining physical drivers in an objective assessment of risk, which can both be applied at a European scale, and explicitly compared with the ESAIS to provide local downscaling.