The symposium takes place on Monday 26 September, three days before the Heineken Prize is officially presented during an extraordinary meeting of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) in Amsterdam.
In Wageningen, Prof. Mace will speak on the problem of valuing nature in a human-dominated world. The Heineken Prize is in recognition of her work developing clear, scientific criteria for a comprehensive list of threatened species, and establishing a set of priorities for nature conservation.
Prof. Mace has also made a major contribution to the notion that healthy ecosystems and biodiversity are natural capital that render important services to humans: now a central concept in the nature management debate.
The other main speakers in Wageningen are Prof. David Kleijn, chair of the Plant Ecology and Nature Conservation Group at Wageningen UR, and Dr Wouter Halfwerk, Assistant Professor at the Animal Ecology Group of VU University Amsterdam and winner of the 2016 Heineken Young Scientists Award for Environmental Sciences.
The symposium will be hosted by NIOO-director Louise Vet, who was also the chair of the A.H. Heineken Prize jury. Attending the symposium is free of charge, and anyone interested in nature conservation is welcome. However, registration is required and the number of places available is limited.