Scottish Biodiversity Information Forum Access and Use of Biological Data Questionnaire
The Scottish Biodiversity Information Forum (SBIF) was established in June 2012 following discussions within the biodiversity community in Scotland. It is a community-led forum which brings together stakeholders from organisations actively involved in the collection, management, sharing or use of species or habitat data both in the terrestrial and marine environment.
To deliver the above aspirations, the SBIF Review was published in November 2018. In December 2019 a project proposal was submitted to the Scottish Government to deliver the 24 recommendations that came out of the SBIF Review. This was unsuccessful. However, it was indicated a smaller project may be successful in gaining funding.
The SBIF Review took the view that biological data should be freely available at the highest resolution possible. Any costs mentioned in the questionnaire below relate to paying for staff time to processing or interpret biological data, not for the purchasing of raw data.
SBIF have submitted a funding application to NatureScot seeking funding for a two-year project that will begin to deliver some outcomes proposed in the review namely;
- Facilitate discussions on creating a national consortium of LERCs, LRCs and Recording Groups.
- Creation of a single shared National Database for biological records to replace the regional/ local databases that currently exist.
- Creation of a National Data Hub to facilitate common data product standards across Scotland.
To help get the project proposal shovel ready, SBIF are seeking the views of CIEEM members about their view and experience of accessing and using biological data in the course of their work. Completing the questionnaire should take no longer than 5 minutes – thank you in advance for your time.