Why put forward participatory sciences?

The participatory sciences help improving the knowledge on biodiversity by collecting an important amount of data that couldn’t have been provided otherwise to the scientists, and which shall then be used to enrich the answers to be given and elaborate solutions to better protect said biodiversity.

They have another stake, which is just as important: playfully educating and raising awareness on the biodiversity issues, while imparting a feel of usefulness to the volunteers. This approach helps understanding the mechanisms that lead to biodiversity degradation and fostering practice changes.

Participatory sciences equally provide a network of a representative knowledgeable on the environmental cause.

Participatory sciences

This measure is related to the measure for the support of municipalities.

What does implementing a participatory science program imply?

  • The COGard shall host work meetings with the municipalities and the territorial actors in order to identify the proper program. According to their needs and expectations, it shall be either broad-based (fauna flora) or with a topic specific to each municipality (for instance, amphibians for La Capelle, insects for Sanilhac and birds for Bouquet).
  • Tools and protocols meant for data centralising shall then be put into practice, based on existing and operating systems: Faune-Occitanie, Biodiv’Occitanie, the MNHN’s (National Museum of Natural History) Nature Lookout, the OPIE’s (Office for insects and the environment) Lucane study, SPIPOLL (Photographic Follow-up of Pollinating Insects, etc.
  • The COGard shall then train the participants at both using the tools and recognising the targeted species. The provided training shall allow the involvement of the elected representatives, municipal officials, associations, locals, and eventually that of one-off visitors.
  • In order to assess the impact of these measures, and for these participatory sciences tools to last, the municipal officials shall also be trained to recover the collected results. A special online page shall allow the entry of data and facilitate recovering and perusing the results.

The participatory sciences programme shall be rounded off with 3 public activities involving the toad tunnels in order to raise awareness on the amphibian road collision issue.

The project throughout time

  1. Étape 01

    Selecting the participatory sciences programs

  2. Étape 02

    Tool conception

  3. Étape 03

    Training participants

  4. Étape 04

    Training municipal officials

  5. Étape 05

    Creating an interface for entering and perusing