The future of biological recording in Britain
The annual conference of the National Federation for Biological Recording
Filton, Bristol, 7-8 April 2011
This was always going to be an ambitious topic, but the NFBR felt that now was the time for everyone to step back and examine just what we need to be doing in the business of biological recording for the future.
At the same time, the NFBR has been considering what its own position in the process might be, and it has come to the conclusion that it needs to try and act as a catalyst to get all the major players – voluntary and public sector, even commercial bodies – working towards a more integrated approach.
The Conference had two sessions – the first on the Thursday reviewing the current state of play and activities in a range of different organisations involved in one way or the other with biological recording or biodiversity data; the second session, a full day of presentations and discussions examining key themes relevant to the future of biological recording.
The Thursday session had brief presentations from
• NBN Trust (with Chief Executive Jim Munford discussing the Trust’s achievements and its vision for the future as an integrated network, involving all partners)
• Association of Local Environmental Records Centres (Chairman: Gary Lewis, presenting feedback on recent developments and stimulating considerable debate about the role of ALERC and LERCs in general)
• The BBC’s ‘Breathing Places’ Project (Ian Garman of the BBC Nature Web Team, talking about experiences working alongside some national schemes in developing a public outreach programme)
• Scottish Natural Heritage (Alan McKirdy, SNH’s Head of Information Management, giving a round-up of biodiversity data collection and use in Scotland, especially the recent Scottish Government backing for a more integrated network)
• The OPAL Project (Lucy Carter of the Natural History Museum team involved with OPAL, discussing the work to date with supporting the recording effort, and the potential legacy of OPAL after 2012)
The key messages coming from these talks seemed to be a) the need for even greater precision and integration of effort; b) the problem of resources for the future.
The Thursday’s debates led on well to the contributions on the Friday. These were designed to focus on a number of key issues:
1. The statutory and public sector drivers for biodiversity data collection in the foreseeable future.
2. The problem of funding, especially for voluntary sector bodies involved with biodiversity data collection.
3. The increasing demand for high quality data for scientific research and key environmental issues.
4. The future role of new technologies for data collection and management.
5. The question of engaging with the public, and especially the impact of new media of communication
6. The question of how best to tackle the issues of engaging and training future generations of people to carry out recording.
The talks were given by people engaged with existing organisations or activities, but with special interest in or expertise in these topics.
Our first contribution was from Mark Stevenson of Defra, who gave us what he was able to of the Government’s ideas of the way forward. Unfortunately, progress with the forthcoming White Paper on the Environment had been slower than expected, so he was unable to fill us in with much detail. However, it was clear that there is a great need for high quality, well-integrated and efficiently collected data, so that the Government’s support (bearing in mind 30% cuts in overall spending) will be clearly focused on priorities. The message that it will support key infrastructure to as great an extent as possible was clear, but that efficiencies were expected in mechanisms and methods. He also posed the question as to what the venue should be for the debate about exactly how these priorities should be met.
Martin Warren from Butterfly Conservation was our next contributor, giving us a clear round-up of the spectacular success of Butterfly Conservation’s recording work. However, his up-beat message was tempered by the clear enunciation of the vulnerability of the recording network, particularly the issue of finding ongoing funds. Repeat funding from major potential sources is rarely available, making it increasingly difficult to find sustainable sources. Without core support for the volunteer networks, there is a strong danger that they will not function in the future. He also identified the need for key users of data to expect to be supporting the recording effort.
David Roy of the Biological Records Centre, which oversees the activities of most of the country’s national recording schemes, gave us detail of research uses of data, particularly relevant to climate change science, and demonstrating the clear need for higher quality and more integrated data. He also highlighted the need for a ‘gap-analysis’ of existing data availability and prioritisation exercise to be undertaken.
At this mid-way point, the NFBR fielded its own Vice-chairman, Steve Whitbread, who has been responsible for developing with others the NFBR’s own ‘Strategy’ vision paper ‘From Recording to Revelation’, along with a discussion paper on ‘Towards joining the dots’, both of which were distributed at the meeting. The former was subsequently formally adopted at the NFBR AGM the same day as the basis for its work for the next few years. He gave an outline of the thinking in the NFBR, primarily that there is a need for a more integrated approach to biological recording and data use in general, which ought to involve a gap analysis, as well as an integrated approach to a ‘Biodiversity Information Strategy’ for the country as a whole, taken forward by all those with a stake in the business, both public and private/voluntary sectors.
Following lunch and the NFBR AGM, the conference re-convened to change focus slightly towards the more technical side of the future. John van Breda, responsible largely for many of the current technological advances, such as Indicia etc., gave us a broader view of the future impact of these developments, as well as on some of the limitations. On-line recording is likely to be a major change, but equally important are the dissemination of standards and the integration of development projects. Limitations remain from the patchy coverage of Broadband internet access, limiting the capacity of field recording technologies. However, the Internet will offer the capacity to integrate resources from a wide range of different sources, through the Semantic Web.
Charles Roper followed this up, looking with a wry smile at the untapped resources (if potentially anarchic) of Facebook, Twitter etc. He made the Conference aware just how much others outside the Conference already knew what was being said, through delegate participation in Twitter feeds. His main points included the need for the recording community to make a more co-ordinated use of these media, through corporate ‘presences’, and also to highlight the capacity to index contributions, thus making it possible to tap into the apparently anarchic mass of information in an orderly way, combining on-line recording with live feeds for data entry; for which he suggested setting up a ‘think-tank’ to take things forward.
Finally Sarah Whild of Birmingham University and the Botanical Society of the British Isles, gave us a 21st century view of the future for engaging and training new recruits to biological recording, while reflecting on the catastrophic demise (with no immediate sign of official improvements) in taxonomic education at school and university level. She suggested that organisations like the NFBR and its partners could help this issue through co-ordinated development of resources, and encouragement of mentor programmes.
Report written by Trevor James, NFBR Chairman and Conference Organiser