RECOMMENDATION 8: SYSTEM SIMPLIFICATION

The systems and tools available for collecting, curating, aggregating and disseminating biological records across all environments (terrestrial, freshwater and marine) and sectors should be rationalised.

A ‘system simplification’ exercise should be undertaken to rationalise systems and develop an integrated technical road map to maximise inter-operability and ease and speed of data flow to and from the NBN Atlas. The NBN Trust should aid NBN Platform Partners in co-creating an integrated technical road map to maximise the parsimony and synergy of systems in future.

Where important aggregations of biological records exist in stand-alone systems without dissemination via the NBN Atlas, system owners should become NBN Data Partners or Platform Partners (as appropriate) and their funding should focus on mobilisation of their records to the NBN Atlas via automated harvesting of records and/or integration of each stand-alone system to ‘put them on the grid’.