Abstract
Summary Biodiversity is changing at unprecedented rates, and it is increasingly important that these changes are quantified through monitoring programmes. Previous recommendations for developing or enhancing these programmes focus either on the end goals, that is the intended use of the data, or on how these goals are achieved, for example through volunteer involvement in citizen science, but not both. These recommendations are rarely prioritized.We used a collaborative approach, involving 52 experts in biodiversity monitoring in the UK, to develop a list of attributes of relevance to any biodiversity monitoring programme and to order these attributes by their priority. We also ranked the attributes according to their importance in monitoring biodiversity in the UK. Experts involved included data users, funders, programme organizers and participants in data collection. They covered expertise in a wide range of taxa.We developed a final list of 25 attributes of biodiversity monitoring schemes, ordered from the most elemental (those essential for monitoring schemes; e.g. articulate the objectives and gain sufficient participants) to the most aspirational (e.g. electronic data capture in the field, reporting change annually). This ordered list is a practical framework which can be used to support the development of monitoring programmes.People's ranking of attributes revealed a difference between those who considered attributes with benefits to end users to be most important (e.g. people from governmental organizations) and those who considered attributes with greatest benefit to participants to be most important (e.g. people involved with volunteer biological recording schemes). This reveals a distinction between focussing on aims and the pragmatism in achieving those aims. Synthesis and applications. The ordered list of attributes developed in this study will assist in prioritizing resources to develop biodiversity monitoring programmes (including citizen science). The potential conflict between end users of data and participants in data collection that we discovered should be addressed by involving the diversity of stakeholders at all stages of programme development. This will maximize the chance of successfully achieving the goals of biodiversity monitoring programmes.
Highlights
Biodiversity is changing at an unprecedented rate: many species are declining in abundance (Butchart et al 2010) and there is increasing biotic homogenization across the globe (McKinney & Lockwood 1999)
We collaboratively produced a list of 25 attributes covering all the components of relevance to biodiversity monitoring programmes (Fig. 1; Appendix S3)
Our list included all the 25 attributes that we considered relevant to biodiversity monitoring programmes
Summary
Biodiversity is changing at an unprecedented rate: many species are declining in abundance (Butchart et al 2010) and there is increasing biotic homogenization across the globe (McKinney & Lockwood 1999). As a result of concern about the changing state of biodiversity, international targets have been agreed with the aim of bringing a reduction in the rates of loss, for example the Convention on Biological Diversity’s Aichi Targets (http:// www.cbd.int/sp/targets/). Performance against these targets is assessed with currently available biodiversity monitoring information (Baillie, Hilton-Taylor & Stuart 2004; Butchart et al 2010). The currently available information is incomplete (Scholes et al 2008; Pereira et al 2013) Performance against these targets cannot be adequately assessed unless monitoring, and analysis of data, is enhanced. Undertaking monitoring of local resources can empower local stakeholders, including indigenous people in the tropics (Gadgil 2000; Danielsen et al 2011; Pritchard 2013)
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