Category
Wildlife monitoring schemes
Capabilities
Building on centuries of UK wildlife observations, BRC was established in 1964 to coordinate and support wildlife recording across the UK. It now provides leadership, liaison, coordination, expert support and underlying infrastructure - working with 85 National Recording Schemes, Societies and the public - to identify species and to collect, manage, analyse, interpret and publish the UK's wildlife data and records. Outputs include publicly available data, atlases and information on species distribution for a wide range of UK terrestrial and freshwater taxonomic groups covering plants, animals and fungi. BRC provides a world-leading capability in the management and use of volunteer-based wildlife recording. Independent estimates from JNCC calculate provide a collective value of a £20 million per annum in UK volunteers’ time for biodiversity surveillance.
Lifecycle
BRC was established in 1964 and the earliest data comes from the 15th Century. BRC provides a continuous and innovating service to support the collection and accessibility of biological records. Online tools such as iRecord and other associated mobile apps are now widely used to record growing volumes of wildlife data.
Uniqueness
BRC is the only UK-wide records centre for comprehensive wildlife recording. BRC uniquely provides: (1) long-term partnership, coordination and support with almost 100 National Recording Schemes and Societies (e.g. organisations focused on a species group such as butterflies, bryophytes, spiders etc); and (2) innovative technical infrastructure (e.g. Indicia) for supporting citizen science, alongside specialised systems for capturing, reviewing and sharing biodiversity data (e.g. iRecord and associated mobile applications).
Access
Data products produced by BRC are made available via UKCEH's Environmental Information Data Centre (EIDC). Raw data are supplied regularly to the National Biodiversity Network Atlas, and onwards to the Global Biodiversity Information Facility.
Location
BRC is based at UKCEH Wallingford and operates across the UK.
Funding sources
The core function of BRC is supported and part-funded by JNCC (Joint Nature Conservation Committee: Government's advisor on nature) including liaison with the recording community. Specific information products are supported by Defra and devolved government agencies through open competitive funding processes (e.g. biodiversity Indicators). Research using wildlife records is mainly supported by UKRI-NERC through research project grants.
Users
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BRC delivers annual biodiversity indicators for Defra/JNCC. Wildlife records are used by researchers (eg to investigate impacts of environmental and climate change, pollution, and non-native species), environmental policy-makers (governments and their agencies), land managers, conservation organisations and the public.
Last updated
28 April 2022 13:15
