IPBES technical Guidline Series - Directory
Introduction
TGs (Technical Guidelines) are documents that provide technical guidance on specific tasks or methods relevant to the work of IPBES (Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services). They are intended to support the implementation of IPBES assessments and other deliverables by providing practical advice and best practices.
These guidelines are developed by the tsu (IPBES Data and Knowledge Technical Support Unit) together with the associated tf (Task Force on Knowledge and Data) and approved by the MEP (Multidisciplinary Expert Panel) and the Bureau.
Not all TGS are relevant to all IPBES experts. TO make it easier to identify the relevant TGs, each TG is tagged with one or more of the following tags:
expert: Relevant for the TF and other IPBES experts
tsu: Relevant for the IPBES tsus apart from the assessment tsus
secretariat: Relevant for the IPBES secretariat
assesment_tsu: Relevant for the assessment tsus
assesment_experts: Relevant for the assessment experts
Each individual TG is available as a html as well as pdf and is deposited including the source file and all required additional files on Zenodo and consequently has a DOI. At the end of each TG a suggested citation can be found.
Each TG is versioned and the version number is indicated in the document. If a TG is updated, the new version will be made available on Zenodo with a new DOI. The previous versions will remain accessible for reference.
The following Icons are used to indicate the relevant target groups for each TG:
Current Technical Guidelines




Part 1 - Conversion to the Robinson Projection




Part 11 - How to Document an Indicator




Part 12A - file naming convention




Part 12B - versioning scheme




Part 12C - experts list




Part 2 - Preparing and mapping data




Part 3 - Cartographic Guidelines




Part 4 - Guidelines for Colour




Part 5 - File Formats




Part 6 - How to Upload to and Download from Zenodo




Part 8 - Guidelines for the delivery of figures




Part 9 - Considerations when working with Indigenous and local knowledge




Snowball Search for Literature Search and Analysis using OpenAlex
In addition to the typical literature search using search terms, one can conduct a snowball search. A snowball search starts from a set of identified key-papers, and the snowball search will identify the publications cited in the key papers as well as the publications citing the key-paper. This search strategy identifies related articles using citation relationships (not keywords), building a citation network based on the key-papers Here we will demonstrate how a snowballing search can be conducted using OpenAlex and R with code examples and discuss some shortcomings and advantages of this approach. Furthermore, we will outline some analysis approaches and possibilities of a citation network without going into too much detail