Holger Gerdes is a Fellow at Ecologic Institute. He works on the economic valuation of biodiversity and ecosystem services and the assessment of the socio-economic costs of environmental change. The focus of his work is the integration of the value of natural capital into decision-making tools such as cost-benefit analysis and cost-effectiveness analysis. He is fluent in German and English and has good knowledge of French and Dutch.

Holger Gerdes supports the European Environment Agency (EEA) in the context of Ecologic Institute's activities in the European Topic Centre on Biological Diversity (ETC/BD). Here, he focuses on indicator assessments and the socio-economic implications of changes in the status of ecosystems. He has been involved in many service contracts for public authorities, including the European Commission's Directorate-General for the Environment. He contributed to the assessment of the Economic Benefits of the Natura 2000 Network and has previously been involved in the studies on the Cost of Policy Inaction (COPI), which were carried out in the wider context of The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (link is external) (TEEB) program.

Holger Gerdes is involved in research projects as well as in coordination and support actions under the EU's Seventh Framework Programme (FP7). Currently, he coordinates Ecologic Institute's contribution to the project Biodiversity and Sustainable Development in the EU's Outermost Regions and Overseas Countries and Territories (NetBiome-CSA), which aims at strengthening European research cooperation for smart and sustainable management of tropical and subtropical biodiversity in the EU's outermost regions and overseas countries and territories. In the context of the project Restoring River for Effective Catchment Management (REFORM), he contributes to the assessment of the socio-economic costs and benefits related to river restoration in the EU. Within the project A New Environmental Accounting Framework for Policy Analysis (EXIOPOL), he has evaluated the influence of environmental valuations on agricultural policy-making in the EU.

Holger Gerdes is actively involved in communication and education activities in the area of environmental and resource economics. Since 2010, he has supported the Zürich-Basel Plant Science Center in the design of a PhD course on evidence-based policy-making for which he develops student assignments on topics related to the valuation of natural capital. He has also prepared and taught seminars at the Humboldt Universität zu Berlin in the context of a course on ecosystem services and land use.

Holger Gerdes holds a Bachelor’s degree in European Studies from the University of Maastricht (the Netherlands) and a Master’s degree in Environment and Resource Management from the Free University of Amsterdam (the Netherlands).