Local Biodiversity Records Centres (LBRC) are reeling in shock this week. Without prior warning Natural England (NE) have withdrawn their support for LBRC services ‘in favour of open source information’.
So how will this affect me you ask? When submitting a planning application local authorities expect that biodiversity records of the area in question will be included in an ecological assessment. At present most counties in the UK have a Biodiversity Records Centre, the staff at these centres collect records from a number of sources, ecologists, species interest groups, specialist surveyors and individuals. These sources have a range of ability and it is the job of the records centre and their many volunteer species specialists to verify these records. Once verified the records are uploaded onto a national database, and can be queried in such a way that a report can be drawn up focusing on any given grid reference point or planning application area. In the subsequent ecological assessment this, alongside data collected onsite, will inform survey requirements and the level of impact a proposal has in a county wide context allowing the planning officer to make an informed decision. So what are the alternatives – apart from the likely increased cost of desk studies from LBRC? What about the open source alternative that NE has said it favours, well there are online sources. For the most complete species data information the source is NBN, this is the National database that local records centres provide records to. The data on this site does not allow open source data searches without meeting their terms and conditions. This means that these records cannot be used in a commercial setting. They also require users to contact all of the individual recorders for permission, a laborious and costly process, one that the LBRC currently does on your behalf. The reason for this is that many records are provided to the records centre with restrictions. These are put in place for a number of reasons, one of which is to prevent harm coming to the animals recorded, such as badger baiting or egg collection. The process of collection, collation and management of software and reports is a time consuming costly business and whilst collection relies on many volunteers, the service would not be consistent or the quality that it is without funding. Therefore it is thought that those using and benefiting from this work commercially should contribute to the process of delivery, a justifiable aim. At present the LBRC desk study cost is kept low to encourage use, however these costs vary across all record centres. To keep the costs down the record centres work with a number of partners, NE were just one, but a big one. Will the LBRC be able to replace this source of funding without raising costs? It is unlikely. Without the NE support and funding these records would not be available to local authorities, regulatory bodies, research projects or the volunteers who have collected so much of it. Watch this space.
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