The Innovation Lab 2 is located within the territory of the Appennino Tosco-Emiliano Man and
Biosphere UNESCO Reserve, which covers a total surface area of almost 500.00 hectares among the provinces of Parma, Reggio Emilia, Modena, Lucca, Massa Carrara and La Spezia. It includes 80 municipalities and the resident population is about 400.00 people. The MaB Reserve is coordinated by the Appennino tosco-emiliano National Park, located in the Apennines between Emilia-Romagna and Tuscany regions; it stretches along the Apennine ridge and covers territories in both regions. This unique position gives rise to two distinct climatic zones: Mediterranean in the west and continental in the east, resulting in an extraordinary biodiversity.
The National Park hosts 70% of Italy’s flora and fauna, with more than 2.000 species including birds, mammals, amphibians, reptiles and fish of conservation interest. The vegetation typologies include beech-forest (mostly managed by coppice), oak and chestnut woods, high-altitude grasslands and sub-alpine prairies. The landscape has been shaped over centuries by traditional farming, grazing and old trade routes, reflecting a strong and lasting connection between people and nature; a particular role was played by the breeding of cows for the production of Parmigiano Reggiano, a local excellence product.
Nevertheless, in the last 50 years this part of the Apennines has faced a phase of abandonment by local communities, which have moved to the cities. As a result, the Park territory is today extremely fragmented, and the majority of forestry properties are not managed.
The aim of the National Park is to improve the forests’ resilience to the effects of climate
change and to create a system on PES (payment for ecosystem services) based on the sustainable forest management. In order to achieve this goal, the National Park has established a Certification Group to obtain the double FSC® (Forest Stewardship Council) and PEFC (Program for the Endorsement of Forest Certification) certifications, both for the Sustainable Forest Management and for the Ecosystem Services. Through this system, the National Park has created the Sustainability Credits tool, tested as Nature-based Solution to enhance forest planning, support sustainable forest management and establish a local circular economy based on the credits generated within the certified forests. The measurement unit of these types of credits is the tCO2eq (carbon dioxide equivalent ton): one Sustainability Credits corresponds to one ton of carbon dioxide additionally absorbed by certified forests, but in its economic value it also includes all the other ecosystem services provided by forests. This mechanism follows the PEFC Ecosystem Services Standard, through which it is possible to apply the IPCC formula for the calculation of the tCO2eq absorbed by certified forests. The credits are sold on the voluntary credits market and all the income is redistributed proportionally from the National Park to the forests’ owners with the aim of reinvesting in sustainable forest management activities.
Today, thanks to the collaboration of more than 40 forestry landowners, the project includes 49
certified forests for a total of more than 30.000 certified hectares within the MaB UNESCO Reserve, which have generated more than 18.000 Sustainability Credits only in 2025.
Though the ARCADIA project the Co-Innovation Lab 2 aims at improving the resilience of
forests, analysing and disseminating the Sustainable Forest Management practices, and refining the generation procedure of Sustainability Credits, which are now calculated only on carbon dioxide: the goal to achieve is to give an economic value to the others ecosystem services, by developing an alternative methodology based on specific measurement units for every ecosystem services or by refining the existing procedure by redistributing the income of the credits selling in a proper way.
Focusing on sustainable and responsible management of the forests, the Co-Inn. Lab 2 seeks to
economically valorise the ecosystem services provided by natural habitats.