As a sub-project of the enterprise “floodplain development and floodplain network along the Lower Middle Elbe”, the WWF-Floodplain Institute is developing a concept of biotype networks for the Elbe regions from Wittenberge to Dömitz in the UNESCO-biosphere reservoir River Landscape Elbe (Lower Saxony, Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt) in line with the Federal Program for National Biodiversity. Based on the description of the reference state, a variety of scenarios are developed, which serve as input data for an evaluation of relevant ecosystem services for a range of landscape developments by the Technical University (TU) Berlin. The scenarios include intensification as well as alleviation of landscape utilization, the latter aiming for the benefit of floodplain-typical biodiversity or particular floodplain-formative processes in a further scenario, respectively.

In the evaluation of the scenarios, a large-scale exemplary floodplain biotype network concept is developed and substantiated with leading project.