RECOMMENDATION 10: ESTABLISHMENT OF A NETWORK OF NBN REGIONAL HUBS

A network of NBN Regional Hubs operating in partnership with the NBN Trust covering the whole of Scotland should be created.

Each Regional Hub Partner should be required to use the NBN Atlas to aggregate and analyse data for their region or area of interest in order to provide local data services.

Each Regional Hub Partner should also seek to ensure that all biological records for their region become available via the NBN Atlas, actively championing affiliated data submission routes and the NBN Directory of these, and providing support to Recorders and Data Providers from all sectors in pursuit of this.

The national Product Owner for the NBN Atlas should gather and champion requirements from each Regional Hub Partner so that the NBN Atlas and tools provide the necessary capabilities for a Regional Hub to function effectively. NBN Trust should ensure that the boundaries of the Regional Hubs are complementary with no gaps or overlaps in cover.

If no Regional Hub Partner can be found for an area, regional staff could be employed by the NBN National Hub instead.