On Thursday, 29 April 2021, 9-10 AM (NY time), the offcial launch of the ARIES for SEEA Explorer will take place. It’s a new open-source and user-friendly digital technology which enables standardized and customizable ecosystem accounting. The Explorer will be available starting 29 April.
The launch will include a demonstration as well as remarks from Mr. Stefan Schweinfest (Director, UNSD), Mr. Risenga Maluleke, Statistician-General of Statistics South Africa, and Chair of the UNCEEA and Deputy Director General of Statistics Netherlands, Mr. Bert Kroese.
System of Environmental and Economic Accounting
SEEA stands for ‘System of Environmental and Economic Accounting’. This Artificial Intelligence (AI)-powered application for rapid natural capital accounting has been developed by the Statistics Division (SD) of the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA) and the UN Environment Program (UNEP), in collaboration with the international research and innovation platform Artificial Intelligence for Environment & Sustainability (ARIES) at the Basque Centre for Climate Change (BC3).
The new open-source and user-friendly digital technology enables, for the first time, rapid, standardized and customizable ecosystem accounting anywhere on earth. ARIES for SEEA will be available on the UN Global Platform: a cloud-service environment supporting international collaboration among all countries in the world by sharing scientific knowledge, data, methods and technology.
The launch event will explain how the ARIES for SEEA Explorer takes a new, ground-breaking, interoperable approach that uses artificial intelligence for ecosystem accounts compilation and provides a basis for the eventual customization of models. It will cover the role of the ARIES for SEEA Explorer in the big data landscape and the relevance of the platform for global initiatives such as the SDGs and post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework; provide a demonstration of the application; and include a question-and-answer session.
Programme
Welcome messages
- Mr. Stefan Schweinfest, Director of the United Nations Statistics Division
- Mr. Risenga Maluleke, Statistician-General of Statistics South Africa and Chair of the UN Committee of Experts on Big Data and Data Science for Official Statistics
Demonstration of the ARIES for SEEA Explorer
- Mr. Ferdinando Villa, ARIES lead investigator
- Q&A moderated by Ms. Alessandra Alfieri, Chief Environmental Economic Accounts Section
Closing reflections
- Mr. Bert Kroese, Deputy Director General of Statistics Netherlands and Chair of the UN Committee of Experts on Environmental Economic Accounting