Abstract
Expanding involvement of the public in citizen science projects can benefit both volunteers and professional scientists alike. Recently, citizen science has come into focus as an important data source for reporting and monitoring United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Since bees play an essential role in the pollination ecosystem service, citizen science projects involving them have a high potential for attaining SDGs. By performing a systematic review of citizen science studies on bees, we assessed how these studies could contribute towards SDG reporting and monitoring, and also verified compliance with citizen science principles. Eighty eight studies published from 1992 to 2020 were collected. SDG 15 (Life on Land) and SDG 17 (Partnerships) were the most outstanding, potentially contributing to targets related to biodiversity protection, restoration and sustainable use, capacity building and establishing multi stakeholder partnerships. SDG 2 (Zero Hunger), SDG 4 (Quality Education), and SDG 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities) were also addressed. Studies were found to produce new knowledge, apply methods to improve data quality, and invest in open access publishing. Notably, volunteer participation was mainly restricted to data collection. Further challenges include extending these initiatives to developing countries, where only a few citizen science projects are underway.
Highlights
IntroductionCitizen science (CS), which can be defined as the involvement of (usually unpaid) volunteers in the scientific process (e.g., data collection, analysis, and interpretation) [1,2], has been used for different purposes, including biodiversity and environmental monitoring of both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems
Citizen science (CS), which can be defined as the involvement of volunteers in the scientific process [1,2], has been used for different purposes, including biodiversity and environmental monitoring of both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems
Most studies were undertaken on a local scale (Figure 1) and comprised data from long-term citizen science projects (73%, n = 60), including 47 ongoing projects
Summary
Citizen science (CS), which can be defined as the involvement of (usually unpaid) volunteers in the scientific process (e.g., data collection, analysis, and interpretation) [1,2], has been used for different purposes, including biodiversity and environmental monitoring of both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. Data produced through citizen science initiatives is speeding up, in an unprecedented way, understanding of patterns and functions in biodiversity [3,4,5], thereby contributing towards natural resource management, environmental protection and policymaking, as well as fostering public input and engagement [6,7,8]. Sustainability 2021, 13, 959 as a source of data for SDG reporting and monitoring, potentially contributing to 76 of the 244 SDG indicators [11]. If used in accordance with ethical and scientific principles [13,14], CS has enormous potential to expand knowledge about global biodiversity, reducing taxonomic and spatial biases in global biodiversity data sets, moving beyond data on the occurrence of single species and providing further understanding of ecological interactions among species or habitats [15]
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