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Short Abstract

The National Monitoring Centre for Biodiversity and the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin explore the contribution of Citizen Science to national monitoring and measures to strengthen it. We share key gaps, barriers and enablers, and invite exchange on strategies, capacity building and data integration.

Abstract

In the last couple of years the German National Monitoring Centre for Biodiversity and the Museum für Naturkunde in Berlin have joined forces to tap into and strengthen the potentials of Citizen Science for national biodiversity monitoring, bringing together perspectives from policy, society and science. Thereby we are aiming to better understand gaps, barriers and enablers to develop strategies for professionalizing Citizen Science and for capacity building in biodiversity monitoring. Topics range from improvement of inclusive engagement and knowledge to long-term data coverage and data quality.

For this workshop we can report results from our workshops and an extensive survey where we showcase how needs within biodiversity monitoring and suitability of citizen science come together; for what reasons citizen science projects are considered "successful"; and insights into opinions of taxonomic experts. Together with workshop participants we offer to go into further discussion and mutual learning to understand how to transform this knowledge into actionable steps. Additionally, we aim to identify and map various pillars of data- and knowledge sources within Citizen Science contributing to biodiversity monitoring.