The first CONCERTO newsletter is officially published, offering a snapshot of the project’s key developments and achievements during its initial six months. 

This edition highlights our progress in building a strong collaborative foundation, launching outreach efforts, and initiating early scientific and communication activities. It also provides insight into the diverse contributions of our partners, and showcases the momentum we’ve built across multiple fronts, from stakeholder engagement to knowledge sharing.

We invite you to read the full newsletter and explore how CONCERTO is building a collaborative path toward climate resilience through nature-based solutions and cross-sectoral cooperation.

From 27 April to 2 May 2025, the European Geosciences Union (EGU) held its General Assembly, the largest gathering of geoscientists in Europe. The conference brought together thousands of researchers from over 100 countries, both in Vienna and online, to discuss the latest advancements in Earth, planetary, and space sciences.

Within the diverse programme, the CONCERTO project was presented with a focus on land use/land cover (LU/LC) and leaf area index (LAI) reconstruction.

The presentation, titled “Reconstructing historical land use/land cover and LAI using multiple data streams and machine learning”, showcased ongoing work within the CONCERTO framework to improve retrospective environmental datasets through advanced data integration techniques. This reconstruction effort is essential for enhancing the realism and accuracy of Earth system models, particularly in understanding how ecosystems respond to climate change and anthropogenic pressures.

The abstract is publicly available on the EGU platform.

CONCERTO’s presence at EGU 2025 fostered valuable exchanges with the broader geoscientific community and raised visibility for the project’s mission to strengthen biodiversity and climate modelling through robust, data-driven methodologies.

Between 7–11 April 2025, ECMWF celebrated its 50th anniversary in Bonn, Germany. The programme included an Annual Seminar, multiple scientific workshops, and a formal reception attended by dignitaries such as the Mayor of Bonn, ECMWF Director-General Florence Rabier, and senior representatives from the German Federal Ministry and German Weather Service.

The dedicated workshop on “Ancillary data for land surface and Earth system modelling” attracted 35 in-person and 18 online participants, including land‑surface scientists from ECMWF and the UK Met Office, and featured 13 presentations and a lively poster session.

CONCERTO was presented during the poster session, alongside its sister project CERISE, showcasing a reconstruction of land cover and Leaf Area Index (LAI) using artificial intelligence and machine learning methods. The projects' posters highlighted cutting-edge AI/ML applications to build multi-decadal records of vegetation cover and LAI, an essential step toward improving our understanding of land–atmosphere interactions.  

The poster presentation generated strong interest, and sparked in-depth discussions on how these emerging reconstructions can continuously support the climate and ecosystem modelling within CONCERTO and related initiatives. With ECMWF placing a strong emphasis on advancing machine learning in data assimilation and forecasting, CONCERTO’s work aligned perfectly with the meeting’s core scientific themes.