Knowledge Exchange Fellowship: Bringing the data revolution to nature recovery

最近环境问题意识的提高促使世界各国政府做出了强有力的政策回应。英国和其他政府对这场危机的回应包括雄心勃勃的政策，如25年环境计划和自然恢复网络(英格兰)、子孙后代法案(威尔士)、苏格兰环境战略和北爱尔兰环境战略。这些政策旨在阻止生物多样性的丧失，恢复健康和多产的生态系统，授权下放的行政当局和当地社区照顾他们的环境，造福自然和社会。评估这些政策和倡议的成功需要监测数据，以建立基准并跟踪实现环境目标的进展情况。然而，尽管英国有通过公民科学和各种国家和地方野生动物监测计划监测生物多样性的悠久传统，但从现有数据中得出强劲的生物多样性趋势在技术上仍然具有挑战性。NERC资助的科学通过开发新的分析解决方案来解决其中一些挑战。国家能力方案，如ASHISE和UK-SCAPE，以及其他筹资倡议，如化学品在环境中的新风险和构建数字环境方案，正在积极促进开发新的统计方法，以分析公民科学数据，得出强劲的生物多样性趋势，以及实施这些方法并将结果转化为国家生物多样性指标的软件。国家环境研究中心资助的研究产生了大量有关生物多样性评估的知识和专业知识。然而，重大的理解障碍阻碍了这些知识在多大程度上造福于负责环境政策交付的组织。NERC资助的研究在支持各种规模的自然恢复的雄心勃勃的目标方面具有巨大的潜力。将提供自然恢复的组织(如保护机构、野生动物信托基金)对NERC科学产生的分析工具和专业知识有很大的需求。该KE项目的主要目标是将NERC资助的生物多样性监测和分析的方法学进步转化为数据持有者、土地管理者、政策制定者和保护从业者可以直接获得的形式。这一目标将通过双向知识流动实现：与英国各地的主要利益相关者和保护界代表共同设计、共同开发和共同交付。这可能包括用户叙述文件或用于共享数据和数据分析工作流程的数字工具。一旦开发完成，这些产品将通过一系列研讨会和活动向广大利益攸关方宣传。我将在自然保护数据科学领域的利益相关者和研究人员之间建立一个实践社区，以便在此奖学金有效期之后继续知识流动。我将组织一系列的工作坊和黑客松，以激发新的想法，为KE寻找新的和未来的机会，并提供培训和支持。这一参与空间将鼓励讨论，这将促进共同开发新的研究和相关最终用户迅速接受任何未来的分析发展。在地方范围内提供国家环境政策非常需要实地解决方案，这一奖学金将通过使生物多样性数据和数据科学工具更容易获得来满足这一需求。最终，该奖学金将通过增加生物多样性监测数据的可用性和支持基于证据的自然恢复规划方法，帮助国家和地方组织实现其环境政策目标。

The recent rise in awareness of environmental issues has prompted a strong policy response from governments across the world. The UK and Devolved Governments' responses to this crisis include ambitious policies such as the 25 Year Environment Plan and Nature Recovery Network (for England), the Future Generations Act (in Wales), The Environment Strategy for Scotland and the Environment Strategy for Northern Ireland. These policies aim to halt biodiversity loss and restore healthy and productive ecosystems, by empowering devolved administrations and local communities to look after their environment for the benefit of nature and society. Evaluating the success of these policies and initiatives requires monitoring data to establish a baseline and track progress towards environmental goals. However, despite the UK's long tradition of monitoring biodiversity through citizen science and various national and local wildlife monitoring schemes, it remains technically challenging to derive robust biodiversity trends from available data. NERC funded science has tackled some of these challenges by developing novel analytical solutions. National Capability programmes, such as ASSIST and UK-SCAPE, and other funding initiatives, such as the Emerging Risks of Chemicals in the Environment and Constructing a Digital Environment programmes are actively contributing to the development of novel statistical methods to analyse citizen science data to derive robust biodiversity trends, as well as software to implement these methods and convert the results into national biodiversity indicators.NERC funded research has generated a considerable amount of knowledge and expertise around biodiversity assessment. However, significant barriers to uptake have hampered the degree to which this knowledge has benefitted organisations responsible for the delivery of environmental policy. NERC-funded research has enormous potential to support the ambitious goals for nature recovery, at a range of scales. There is great demand for the analytical tools and expertise generated by NERC science among organisations that will deliver nature recovery (e.g. conservation agencies, wildlife trusts).This KE project's main goal is to translate NERC funded methodological advances in biodiversity monitoring and analysis into a form that is directly accessible to data holders, land managers, policy makers and conservation practitioners. This goal will be achieved through a two-way knowledge flow: co-design, co-development and co-delivery with key stakeholders and representatives of the conservation community across the UK. This may include user narrative documentation or digital tools for the sharing of data and data analysis workflows. Once developed, these products will be promoted to a large audience of stakeholders through a series of workshops and events. I will create a community of practice among the stakeholders and researchers in the field of data science for nature conservation in order for the knowledge flow to continue beyond the lifetime of this fellowship. I will organise a series of workshops and hackathons to stimulate new ideas, identify new and future opportunities for KE and provide training and support. This engagement space will encourage discussions, which will facilitate the co-development of new research and the quick uptake of any future analytical developments by the relevant end users. There is great need for on-the-ground solutions to deliver national environmental policies at the local scale and this fellowship will meet this demand by making biodiversity data and data science tools more accessible. Ultimately, the fellowship will help national and local organisations to achieve their environmental policy targets by increasing the usability of biodiversity monitoring data and supporting an evidence-based approach to nature recovery planning.