Connecting Nature Deliverable 3: Interactive, online toolkit containing innovative evidence-based demonstrations for nature-based solutions deployment in cities

The development of the Connecting Nature Impact Assessment Framework has been accompanied by a series of resources that can be used by cities whose objective is to build capacity to mainstream impact assessment as part of their nature-based solutions policies and plans. Together, they form an impact assessment toolkit for cities. The objective of this Deliverable is to provide a brief description of each of the elements of the toolkit, while the resources and tools themselves can be consulted online, by following the provided links in Appendices I and II. All these materials have been uploaded to websites and platforms so that the elements are easily searchable and downloadable by users. The resources generated fall into the following four categories:

1) Impact assessment plans, results, and integration of data for the Connecting Nature frontrunner cities

2) Finding inspiration: nature-based solutions repositories and databases: OPPLA, the EU Repository of Nature-Based Solutions, and the NBS data and knowledge base created by Dushkova and Haase (2020).

3) The CO-IMPACT tool to design bespoke impact assessment plans, a decision-support tool for the design of monitoring and evaluation plans, with suggestions for appropriate indicators and methodologies. It is one of the main innovations in the project.

4) Additional monitoring and evaluation resources for cities, including handbooks and indicator factsheets to support cities in impact assessment

The deliverable also presents the Connecting Nature plans for ensuring the sustainability of project innovations beyond the official end of the project. It describes the design of the Connecting Nature Resource Center, an online repository of searchable resources embedded in the European platform OPPLA.

In addition to these five main sections, this document has two appendices. The first one the main resources, and includes keywords, location, description, uses of the product, and associated links. In the second appendix, the impact assessment video trainings are listed, along with links to the videos for easy access.

All the resources presented in this Deliverable make up an interactive, online toolkit to support nature-based solutions impact assessment and deployment in cities. containing innovative evidence-based demonstrations for nature-based solutions deployment in cities. The toolkit will also be presented at the CN final Summit in Genk and will seek to stimulate emerging partnerships to support impact assessment plans and investments in cities.