Call for marine biodiversity (monitoring) data

Description

The selected beneficiaries will establish ingestion pipelines of marine biodiversity data, and thereby increase the flow of relevant biodiversity data to the EU DTO. The selected beneficiaries commit to carry out the following activities: Participate in the workshop which will provide training on how to reformat and quality control data conform international standards (see further) and make these available to EMODnet Biology, held from the 3rd of June to the 5th of June 2025 in Paris (3 full days). In-person attendance of at least one representative per selected beneficiary is required. It will also be possible to attend the training workshop online, in case multiple people per beneficiary want to attend the workshop but cannot all attend in person. Complete the online training course provided by EMODnet Biology (required for at least one representative per selected beneficiary). Contribute to the flow of marine biodiversity data into the DTO, through developing data flow pipelines to EMODnet Biology. Setting up a data flow through intermediate data systems that already have or will in the near future have a direct data flow pipeline to EMODnet Biology (e.g. ICES, ETN) is also eligible. Optimize the data flow so that it is as much as possible automated and commit to continued data submission, ensuring sustained data flows to the DTO. Ensure the data is formatted, standardized, and quality-controlled conforming to the relevant international standards (as demonstrated in the workshop and the EMODnet Biology online training course) (e.g. using the Darwin Core standard for biodiversity data, OBIS-ENV-DATA as the preferred format, World Register of Marine Species, Marine Regions and BODC NERC Vocabulary Server (NVS) to standardize taxonomic names, location names and parameter names respectively, EMODnet Biology QC Check tool to perform quality checks). Ensure that metadata and data will become available through EMODnet Biology. Data need to be published on an Integrated Publishing Toolkit (IPT) instance and pass the EMODnet Biology Quality Control process. Ensure the data complies to Open Access, preferably under a Creative Commons CC-BY license. If applicants plan to use any other license, this needs to be detailed in their application. Provide short intermediary reports on their progress every four months, and a final report on the results at the end of the 12-month project. Timeline March 31st 2025: Evaluation completed & beneficiaries informed From May 1st 2025 to April 30th 2026 (12 months): Project implementation June 3rd-5th 2025: Mandatory attendance of the planned workshop August 31st 2025: First interim report + online course completion deadline December 31st 2025: Second interim report deadline April 30th 2026: Final report, data available and project completion deadline

Beneficiary & submission

Applicants should submit their application through the Open Call webform on the DTO-BioFlow website, where the filled-in application template needs to be submitted. If you do not already have an account on the DTO-Bioflow website, you will need to create one first to access the Open Call webform. Applications need to be submitted by February 28th 2024. Eligibility criteria and other details can be found on the DTO-BioFlow website. The assessment panel will rate all eligible proposals, taking into account the following criteria: Relevance: The proposal conforms to the requirements, goals and scope of the DTO-BioFlow project. Impact: What will be the estimated impact? Size/number, frequency, continuance, and range (temporal/geographic/taxonomic) of proposed dataset(s) will be considered, in combination with how much the proposed data contribute to filling gaps in the current biodiversity data landscape (gaps could be taxonomical, geographical, methodological, etc.). The following ICES ecoregions have the most missing data in EMODnet Biology: Arctic Ocean, Faroes, Greenland Sea, Iceland Sea, Azores, Ionian Sea and the Central Mediterranean Sea, and the Aegean-Levantine Sea. Projects containing data from within these regions will thus receive a higher impact score. Sustained data flow & automation: the data flows set up within the project are designed to continue beyond the duration of the project. They should be/are as much as possible automated and the applicants are willing to commit to a long-term data flow, beyond the duration of their grant and the DTO-BioFlow project duration. Uniqueness: the proposal does not overlap with existing data pipelines and networks. Excellence/proposal quality: the proposed actions are realistic, feasible, well-defined and in balance with the requested financial support. An initial ranking will be constructed based on this evaluation. Additional factors might impact the final list of third parties receiving funding, such as the amount of requested budget, similarity to a higher ranked proposal, ethical concerns and potential conflicts of interest. Evaluation will be completed and applicants informed by March 31st 2025.

Further information

All information regarding the DTO-BioFlow call for marine biodiversity (monitoring) data can be found on the DTO-BioFlow website. For any questions related to this call, please contact opencalls@dto-bioflow.eu.