RECOMMENDATION 5: PROVISION OF RECORDS COLLECTED UNDER LICENCE OR FOR CONSENT/STATUS

Biological records collected with public funding, under licence, for Environmental Impact Assessment or planning consent, or for an academic or professional qualification, should be provided to the NBN Atlas as a matter of good practice.

Licences, consents, funding or professional or academic status granted by a relevant professional or statutory body should facilitate the timely provision of relevant biological records (i.e. species occurrence records) to the NBN Atlas as a matter of good practice.

The NBN Trust should seek to facilitate digital interfaces with Local Authority ePlanning portals, public digital data repositories and other platforms or internal business systems so that, wherever possible, biological records can be deposited once in a way that also ensures effortless provision to the NBN Atlas.

NBN Trust Partner Liaison Officers should focus on supporting academic institutions, commercial companies and public bodies in Scotland to realise value from use of the NBN Atlas to share or access biological records.