Dr Beryl Morris1, Dr Andrew Gilbert, Dr Andre Zerger
1TERN, Brisbane, Australia
Capture and sharing of Australia’s biodiversity data has improved significantly in the past decade through initiatives such as Atlas of Living Australia, Terrestrial Ecosystem Research Network, Bioplatforms Australia, state and territory biodiversity data systems, the work of Australia’s biodiversity collections (museums and herbaria), and contributions from citizen science platforms such as iNaturalist. However, other important biodiversity data in Australia remain inaccessible.
A national biodiversity data system is needed to help understand the biodiversity of Australia, improve decision-making, improve the management and conservation of our biodiversity and environment, forecast change, and measure impacts of events such as droughts, climate change and natural disasters. Due to the breadth and depth of biodiversity data, this can only be done in a collaborative, participatory fashion.
Twelve principles are recommended to guide activities that lead towards a cohesive national biodiversity data system that maximises data re-use for research, product development and decision-making:
- Focus on building a shared, co-owned and co-managed Australian Biodiversity knowledge asset
- Seek to uplift national capacity
- Establish partnerships
- Develop and encourage adoption of national standards
- Govern Australia’s biodiversity data as a national asset
- Seek alignment across related initiatives, programs, and strategies
- Focus on trust
- Reduce complexity
- Establish data sharing and operating agreements
- Establish social and institutional structures around biodiversity data
- Incentivise data lodgement
- Enable traceable and linkable data
Adopting these strategic principles will help to unlock biodiversity data to generate value for governments, industry, the research sector, and the community.
Biography:
Dr Beryl Morris is Director of TERN Australia, a national research infrastructure under the Australian Government NCRIS program. Beryl’s career has covered public and private sector executive roles and directorships. She has been the CEO of several companies in the life sciences area, provided strategic leadership in the tertiary sector, designed and implemented complex national science communication programs, commercialised technology and authored books and papers on a range of topics including science, education and management.