Biodiversity and Environmental Change an Integrated Study Encompassing a Range of Scales, Taxa and Habitats

Client: Environmental Protection Agency

BioChange was an integrative, multi-disciplinary research framework to support national and local biodiversity policy in Ireland, which was administered by BEC Consultants. Core research within the project addressed the protection and management of ecological resources in the context of pressures that might lead to environmental change by focusing on habitat fragmentation and loss, impacts of non-native species, climate change, pollution and resource management. The aims of the project included developing fundamental biodiversity research and capacity building in taxonomic skills, as well as the development of biodiversity indicators and biomonitoring tools.

Two cross-cutting research projects targeted the production of inventories and output of taxonomic data and the understanding of the socio-economic processes that shape biodiversity policies. BioChange also had the aim of bringing together groups of researchers from normally disparate areas to develop a coherent research framework.