The ‘Biodiversity Meets Data’ project will offer a centralised platform for improved biodiversity monitoring across Europe

The European Union (EU) has been working to protect nature for decades, with the Natura 2000 network now safeguarding over 18% of EU land and 9% of its marine territory. Yet, biodiversity is still in trouble, with only 50% of bird species and 15% of habitats in good conservation status. To turn the tide, the EU’s Biodiversity Strategy for 2030 will enlarge existing Natura 2000 areas, implement the EU’s first-ever Nature Restoration Law, and introduce concrete measures to achieve global biodiversity targets. Success will depend on enhancing biodiversity monitoring, making better use of data for decision making, and gaining a clearer picture of how nature is changing.

That’s where the ‘Biodiversity Meets Data’ or BMD project comes in. Launched in March 2025, it will develop a Single Access Point (SAP) as a centralised platform to monitor and drive evidence-based biodiversity conservation across Europe. The SAP will give policymakers and Natura 2000 managers easy access to high-throughput biodiversity monitoring tools with AI species identification services, enabling faster, more accurate and more frequent data collection over larger areas and longer timeframes. It will also unlock historical baseline biodiversity data that is currently scattered, hard to find, or known only to experts. With online projection tools that are co-designed with the stakeholder communities, the SAP will help assess species conservation status, track biodiversity trends, and predict the impact of changes on land, in freshwater, and at sea—from local landscapes to larger scales. These insights will directly support the planning, management, and expansion of protected areas, while also improving conservation strategies by forecasting the effects of future land cover and climate change.

BMD officially launched with a kick-off meeting in Leiden, Netherlands, on 4-5 March 2025. Coordinated by Naturalis Biodiversity Center, the project brings together 14 partner organisations from 10 countries to develop innovative solutions for biodiversity management.

BMD brings together expertise and technology ranging from Plug-n-Play deployment of camera traps, audio recorders and e-DNA sampling kits, to data mobilisation guidelines, large scale FAIR data infrastructures and workflows, and Virtual Research Environments for the terrestrial, freshwater and marine realms. All tools and services will be co-designed with our stakeholder communities, supported by extensive training materials and workshops, and brought together in the BMD Single Access Point. – Niels Raes, BMD coordinator, Naturalis Biodiversity Center

For more project news, follow the project on Bluesky, LinkedIn and stay tuned for more information on the BMD website.

BMD (Biodiversity Meets Data) receives funding from the European Union’s Horizon Europe Research and Innovation Programme and the Swiss State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation (SERI) (ID No 101181294). Views and opinions expressed are however those of the author(s) only and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Union, the European Research Executive Agency (REA) or SERI. The EU, REA and SERI cannot be held responsible for them.