GEOEssential has gathered a strong team of experts in various fields of Earth observations and their applications. With 14 participants from 7 countries, GEOEssential is a mid-size project composed of experienced scientists and teams that have contributed to numerous national and international projects. Several participants have long experience in collaborating with GEO activities (CNR, CREAF, UNIGE, AUTH, MFN, IIASA ). Others have been involved also with Copernicus (GFZ, SRI, IIASA, CNR). Several partners are covering the domain of expertise related to Biodiversity and Ecosystems (SGN, CNR, MfN, UNIGE, CREAF, GFZ and UFZ), others on the Nexus of Food-Water-Energy (IIASA, UNIGE, SRI, FZJ, GFZ) and finally on the Extractive sector (UNIGE) and artificial lights (GFZ). All participants have been particularly active in recent years to improve the interoperability in the GEO community and beyond.

Most participants come from research institutes and academia with a strong publication record in the field. However, these participants share also the interest for applied research connected to policy needs and business opportunities.

CNR, CREAF, GFZ, SGN, UNIGE, AUTH are sharing the responsibilities of leading one or several work packages. The amount of person months and budget has been carefully adapted to their efforts.

At the time of the signature of ERA-PLANET, UNIGE from Switzerland was still considered as an associated partner, so that its budget is not requested to the EU Commission. However, with its good experience in EU project coordination (e.g. enviroGRIDS, EOPOWER) and the relatively high budget requested to the Swiss Confederation, UNIGE is in a very good place to coordinate this project. Furthermore, with its long-lasting collaboration with UNEP/GRID-Geneva and the geographic proximity with the GEO secretariat, UNIGE intends to play a key role in promoting the concept of Essential Variables across the GEO community and beyond with the this project.