Evolution or revolution? – the impact of technologies on biological recording
Report on the 11th annual conference of the National Biodiversity Network
The NBN has been all about new technological approaches to wildlife data communication since it started, and has to a large extent taken the lead in driving these developments forward since its inception.
This Conference was designed to be both a window on ‘where we are’ at the moment, as well as a thinking session for the future. As it happens, it also coincided with significant shifts in potential Government thinking in relation to the environment, and especially on the value and use of environmental data. As a result, we were fortunate to have the opportunity to hear from the Rt. Hon. Richard Benyon MP, Minister for the Environment, as our keynote speaker, opening the event. His address was set against the backdrop of an acknowledged 30% decline in key environmental indicators over the last 10 years while also he reflected on the enormous effort contributed by volunteers (BTO alone contributing the equivalent of 225,000 staff/days a year) on data collection. He noted the importance of new technological approaches, and the need to draw in younger people. He also put the work in the perspective of the Government’s recently produced White Paper and Strategy for the environment, and their underpinning studies, summarised by the UK Environment Assessment. As such, biodiversity monitoring is central to what they need, and it is therefore not surprising that they have stated their intention to support a ‘national biodiversity network’, part of which is a three year agreement with the NBN Trust to support its work.
.jpg "Richard Benyon delivering the keynote speech")
Rt. Hon. Richard Benyon MP takes questions from the delegates
Generally the Minister’s speech was received well, but a few questions remained. Two particularly testing ones included one from ALERC (Nicky Court), who asked what could be done to ensure that the local arm of Government, represented by the Department for Culture and Local Government, was working to the same priorities in terms of support for biodiversity monitoring at the local level as Defra is; while the fraught question of ensuring that the new planning policy framework does not lose good practices built up over recent years was raised by Prof. Jonathan Silvertown of the Open University.
Following on from high level policy, David Roy of the Biological Records Centre started the main proceedings with a talk focusing on the way that new technologies are underpinning the work of the national recording schemes. He looked at the way that the uptake of Indicia online recording is set to transform both data flows and data quality. Online resources such as Bayesian keys, used in ISpot, were also noted; while a newly-emerging opportunity lies with the use of ‘apps’ for mobile devices, tapping into social communication media. Online collaborative tools were also highlighted, such as the recently launched Online Atlas of the British Flora, where material from various sources are brought together in one resource. With the use of data, there are also new developments in using specialised analytical tools that can make the best use of disparate data. He summed up, though, by emphasising that we need to work at developing the ease with which these new tools can be used by people.
Download David Roy's presentation
Paul Gilbertson (left) talks about the new NBN Gateway developments
Paul Gilbertson, NBN Trust’s web development officer, was next to speak, this time about the recently launched new version of the NBN Gateway Interactive Mapping Tool. Paul reviewed where the NBN Gateway had got to, in terms of quantity of data (68 million records), and the strains this was beginning to put on the system to deliver. The new Interactive Mapping Tool has been designed to greatly improve and diversify what the Gateway can do, and he showed some of these new features, such as the capacity to map data quantity by grid square, and to produce integrated maps of species and habitats etc. Beyond the Gateway itself, the system also delivers data through its web-services, and he demonstrated a few of these, such as the ‘Scotland’s Environment’ site. Now the development team are consulting on possible changes to the data access controls on the Gateway, aimed at greatly speeding up data delivery. He emphasised that this was not a ‘done deal’ and that the NBN Trust is keen to hear people’s views, positive or negative, on the proposed changes.
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Charles Hussey, of the Natural History Museum, and in charge of the NBN Species Dictionary, was next to speak, with a subject that could have been very dry indeed. But his introduction, showing slides of Victorian ladies embracing the intricacies of natural history to the extent of evidently expecting the public to know exactly which species of Tardigrade was which, ensured attention! He also demonstrated only too well the problem of ‘multiple names’ for a single organism (80,000 species in the UK, but over 300,000 names in the system for them!). He then went on to talk about the way the Dictionary works, and in particular the way that its re-development is being planned in conjunction with international initiatives to ‘sort out’ the problem through a Global Names Architecture, which would be supported by a broad taxonomic and user community. He finished by saying that he thought the Species Dictionary had done a good job in keeping up with changes – they have carried out 558,750 edits to names in it over as little as 8 years, which is just under 8 changes an hour throughout that period!
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Before our break for lunch, first of all Sally Rankin, recently having taken on the reins of overseeing the Recorder programme from JNCC, along with John van Breda and Mike Weideli, working as a consortium, gave us a brief update of what the new arrangements are, and contact details. Then, Geoff Coates of Syngenta, our sponsors for the event, gave us an eye-opening talk about the work that his company was doing in relation to the agricultural environment, and also demonstrating why it is interested in the biodiversity data NBN Trust deals with. Syngenta have been engaged from their outset in ‘greening’ the Common Agricultural Policy of the EU. In particular, they were involved with the ‘Buzz’ Project, studying bee habitats in relation to pollination. The findings from this research led to further projects, notably ‘Operation Bumblebee’ in 2005, working alongside specialists from BWARS, as well as research institutes and government, and aimed at improving available habitat across the UK in farmland, with focused flower mixes and management regimes, which have seen substantial improvements, so much so that the project has been expanded to become ‘Operation Pollinator’, encompassing other species across 14 countries in Europe.
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Geoff Coates of Syngenta, sponsors of the Conference
Lunch time displays and demonstrations were as wide-ranging as the talks, and many backed up some of the latter. Displays ranged from Syngenta’s stand demonstrating their bee pollination work; through John van Breda’s demonstration of the new Instant Indicia; a demonstration of the use of NBN Record Cleaner by Graham French; David Mitchel of ExeGesIS demonstrating their facilities for data managers; a back-up demonstration of NBN Web-services by Jon Cooper; Commonwealth Agriculture Bureau (CABI) – showing off their ‘Plantwise’ programme; OPAL’s ‘ISpot’, showing its Bayesian keys; UK Earth Observation Framework; and Charles Hussey showing us more about the NBN Species Dictionary re-development.
The NBN Conference has been the venue for the Sir John Burnett Memorial Lecture for the last few years, and this year, the NBN Trust’s outgoing Chairman, Sir Neil Chalmers, who took over from Sir John before the latter’s death in 2007, took the opportunity to give us his thoughts on ‘The UK’s biological records – how useful could and should they be?’. He spoke about the wide range of data that have been gathered over a long time in the UK from local studies in particular; and that participation by a wide range of people is fundamentally important. He asked what the NBN added to this: bringing data together for anyone to use; and making data accessible for multiple uses. For the future, we need to define the wide-scale potential uses of data. There is a plethora of strategies, but we need more focused technical development to make data more immediately useful, such as in planning for High Speed Rail. Evenness of coverage of data needs to be improved, alongside improvements in data quality and their systematic collection. Finally, we need to enable more user-defined responses to the system, to assist with specific enquiries.
There then followed three other focused talks – the first two focusing on technical developments from the use of the NBN’s tools and outputs. Dan Jones spoke about ‘Second Site’ the Yorkshire & Humberside Environmental Data Network’s web-based system for assessing data in relation to planning applications. He approached the talk through looking at the problem first – a multitude of potential data sources, none speaking to each other. The issue of ‘data standards’, as he pointed out, remains to be sorted! Maybe it never will. In the meantime, they have been developing systems that allow flexible and updateable data communication. This is capable of pulling in data in whatever format from elsewhere, and can allow editing of these data. It can also carry out filtering for analysis, and can make use of data derived from a very wide range of sources, including things like Wikipedia, or the BARS habitat reporting system, or even sources such as the photo website Flickr and other social media. As such, it is an extremely potentially powerful method for bringing information together. He faced several interested questions, not least the question of funding. At the moment, there is little funding to support this development work. The question was also asked whether national-level web-services needed to be developed to augment the local capabilities in ‘Second Site’, but, as Dan pointed out, at the moment it is locally focused, and so the lists of species or other attributes it might need tend to be at the local level.
Download Dan Jones' presentation (For more information on Second Site you can contact Dan directly)
Martin Horlock followed with the experiences of Norfolk Biodiversity Information Service in implementing Indicia for their public-facing online recording. The need for Local Environmental Records Centres to ‘embrace a wider audience’ than just their limited pool of recorders had been recognised for a while, despite doubts as to their use from ‘experts’. Their implementation of Indicia was as a response to this, although Martin doubted whether such ‘outreach’ really did much to encourage a ‘new generation of recorders’, as is often claimed. However, the system does increase NBIS profile, allows streamlining of data flows, and improves data quality. Indicia in particular allowed NBIS to make use of the BRC’s online ‘data-store’, which saved local work. The main issue they found was the need to ensure good publicity for surveys. However, on balance they had been pleased about its robustness, and about the improved data quality that has resulted from public surveys. They are now looking at developing Indicia-linked forms for use on e.g. mobile phones, and the use of online sourcing of data browsing facilities through open source sites like ‘ecoRelevé’.
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Jim Munford has a question for Becky Seeley
Our final talk was a thankfully lively one, given the late hour, looking at marine data, given by Becky Seeley of the Marine Biological Association. First she highlighted the differences, as well as the similarities, between mainstream terrestrial NBN data and marine data, not least their use of very different grid systems. As we had found out from the Minister earlier, marine data are a hot topic, especially given the urgent need for better quality data to support Marine Conservation Zones, and to engage with the rapidly increasing incidence of non-native species. Becky outlined the marine data standards being promoted by MEDIN, and pointed up the integration of marine data with NBN, such as the channelling of online data acquisition through the Indicia-based RISC (Recording Invasive Species Counts) system. Such streamlining of data acquisition, and improvement of data quality was again a key issue, and demonstrated the “real benefits of technology”. However, she said that it “may make things easier, but not necessarily simpler”, which was a feeling probably quite a few of us had by the end of the day. However, she also did wind up by saying “Those who don’t engage may get missed out”, which was a message for all those that may not have attended the event to ponder!
Download Becky Seeley's presentation
Report written by Trevor James – 24th November 2011