Transcript Vattakaven Citizen Science and the India Biodiversity Portal

Citizen Science and the India
Biodiversity Portal
Thomas Vattakaven, Strand Life
Sciences, Bangalore, India.
•http://indiabiodiversity.org/
•Aims to aggregate information on the biodiversity of India and make it openly
accessible to all.
•All data is put out under Creative Commons Licences.
Information modules
• Species pages – descriptive content on species
(Crowd sourced from verified users)
• Observations – species sighting records with
media- (Crowd sourced – Citizen science)
• Lists – species records from a locality (Crowd
sourced – Citizen science)
• Maps – map layers containing ecological
information.
• Documents – publications on a species. (Crowd
sourced)
Species Pages
Observations
Map layers
Species lists
Documents
Species Pages
Observations
TreesIndia
• Aim: To document every tree species in India with a photo-essay
and at least one occurrence record.
• Initiated in January 2014
• Collaborative effort – several experts with interest in Trees of India
were invited to join as founders of the group
• Members of IBP were invited to join as participants
• All existing tree observations and species pages were added to the
group.
• A workshop was conducted in February to plan the a campaign to
map and document neighborhood trees across India.
• 33 partcipants across the country attended. These included NGO
representatives, researchers, school teachers and students as well
as Masters’ and PhD students
Neighborhood Trees Campaign
• Users asked to photograph, document and write a
story
• Campaign ran for 1 week from Earth Day 22nd April to
28th April.
• Run exclusively online
• Advertised on email groups, facebook, Google plus and
to all users of IBP
• Press kit and publicity material prepared and provided
to the press – received wide coverage across India
• Interested organizations were asked to join as partners
of the campaign and conduct tree-walks
2283
584
34
14
Gurgaon
Hoshangabad
Mumbai
Panjim
Bangalore
Kottagiri
Thiruvananthapuram
Participation
Percentage of registered users who uploaded observations
Percentage of registered users who provided species Identification
Participation in Species Identification
Less than 20% of the total observations were unidentified during the campaign
The unidentified percentage is now less than 10%
Most identified tree species
31
Ficus religiosa
18
Ficus benghalensis
29
Delonix regia
29
Mangifera indica
20
Artocarpus heterophyllus
17
17
Azadirachta indica
Spathodea campanulata
19
Peltophorum pterocarpum
15
Grevillea robusta
15
Cassia fistula
About 680 species of trees were uploaded during the campaign, of which 68% were native to
India and 32% are introduced species.
Outcome..
• Participation continues with many of the users
becoming regular users. Currently around 750
members.
• There are now 450 tree species pages with at
least 1 image and 1300 species pages with at
least 1 record.
• Continued effort to energize citizens to
participate and upload observations/ provide IDs
and to convert enthusiasts into species page
contributors.
• Neighborhood Trees Campaign 2015
Uploaders
ID providers
274 identified species
Dragonfly Observation Bucket
Challenge
Challenges
•
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Participation
Incentives
Ease of use / user experience
Guiding users on effective documentation and
to overcome biases
• Identification guides
• Value addition
Acknowledgments
Portal Team
Support
Contributors