Studies have documented many biophysical factors that are correlated with urban forest carbon storage. This urban forest function is also increasingly being promoted as a nature-based solution for cities. While urbanization affects both the structure and function of urban forest ecosystems, quantitative analyses of specific casual drivers of carbon storage in urban versus periurban forests are scarce.

Currently, economic development has become a dominant factor in the promotion of urban regeneration in China. This means that decision makers often overlook the impacts on the natural environment when planning urban regeneration within a region. To properly face such challenges and others that may arise, a strategy relying on Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) can enhance the physical and ecological environment of a city, while ensuring greater resilience to natural disasters, and the use of fewer resources.

The valuation of urban water management practices and associated nature-based solutions (NBS) is highly contested, and is becoming increasingly important to cities seeking to increase their resilience to climate change whilst at the same time facing budgetary pressures. Different conceptions of ‘values’ exist, each being accompanied by a set of potential measures ranging from calculative practices (closely linked to established market valuation techniques) – through to holistic assessments that seek to address wider concerns of sustainability.

Sample measurement of mercury (Hg) contents is a common method for health risk assessment of Hg through vegetable consumption in China. In the present work, we undertook the first modelling study which produced consistent health-risk maps for the whole eastern China. Regional maps of Probable Daily Intake (PDI) of Total mercury (THg) and Methylmercury (MeHg) over the studied area were produced, which were important for the researchers and policy-makers to evaluate the risk and to propose mitigation measures if necessary.

The general disproportion of urban development and the socio-economical crisis in Serbia, followed by a number of acute and chronic stressors, as well as years of accumulated trauma, prevented the parallel physical, mental and social adaptation of society as a whole. These trends certainly affected the quality of mental health and well-being, particularly on the vulnerable urban population, increasing the absolute number of people with depression, stress and psychosomatic disorders.

The growing human population concentrated in urban areas lead to the increase of road traffic and artificial areas, consequently enhancing air pollution and urban heat island effects, among others. These environmental changes affect citizen's health, causing a high number of premature deaths, with considerable social and economic costs. Nature-based solutions are essential to ameliorate those impacts in urban areas.

Blue and Green Infrastructures (B&GI) are nature-based solutions considered as particularly efficient to reduce the potential impact of new and existing developments with respect to stormwater issues. In order to assess their performance at some large scales compatible with urban projects, adapted distributed rainfall-runoff models are required. The latest advancements of the Multi-Hydro platform have made possible the representation of such B&GI.

In many countries in the European Union (EU), the popularity of communal urban gardening (CUG) on allotments and community gardens is on the rise. Given the role of this practice in increasing urban resilience, most notably social resilience, municipalities in the Global North are promoting CUG as a nature-based solution (NbS). However, the mechanisms by which institutional actors can best support and facilitate CUG are understudied, which could create a gap between aspiration and reality.

Increasing urbanisation, changing disease scenarios, and current predictions of climate change impacts require innovative strategies for providing healthy and sustainable cities, now and in the future. The recently coined concept, Nature-based solutions (NBS), is one such strategy referring to actions that are inspired by, supported by, or copied from nature, designed to address a range of environmental challenges.

Urban and peri-urban forests are recognized as basic elements for Nature-Based Solutions (NBS), as they preserve and may increase environmental quality in urbanized contexts. For this reason, the amount of forest land per inhabitant is a pivotal efficiency indicator to be considered in the sustainable governance, land management, planning and design of metropolitan areas. The present study illustrates a multivariate analysis of per-capita forest area (PFA) in mainland Attica, the urban region surrounding Athens, Greece.