What is BERDS?
The Biodiversity & Environmental Resource Data System (BERDS) is a comprehensive biodiversity and environmental data warehouse with one purpose - to enhance collaborative research and conservation efforts in Belize by providing shared access to accurate biodiversity and natural resources-related data. BERDS is intended to be a reliable and trusted source of biodiversity, environmental and scientific information, providing equal access to interested individuals, researchers, practitioners and organisations in and outside of Belize. The information in BERDS forms a portion of the national knowledge base that can help contribute to global knowledge on biodiversity through data exchange with other regional and international initiatives.
What makes BERDS so unique is that it merges a wide array of useful data (e.g., documents, contacts, organisations, projects, specimen collections, datasets, websites) with a comprehensive and accurate GIS-based mapping service to form a powerful data investigation tool.
BERDS evolved out of the Belize Biodiversity Mapping Service (BBMS), a simple demonstration of Internet Mapping Server technologies to the Belize Biodiversity Clearing-House Mechanism Working Group in early May 2004. What started out as a simple Internet Mapping demonstration with 5-10 GIS layers has rapidly grown into a full-fledged data warehousing system and research investigation tool developed through a public-private partnership. BERDS currently includes comprehensive and detailed baseline information on the
120 ecosystems, 92 protected areas and 35 watersheds found in Belize as well as
27033 data records for people, organisations, projects, resources (documents, datasets, maps, images, web sites, etc), over 6,955 species accounts and data on over 106,993 specimen collections/observations made by scientists. The system also incorporates 30+ spatial data layers that are accurately projected using the most up-to-date information available in a freely accessible format.
Internet Map Server technologies have been enhanced and integrated throughout the system in a unique fashion to allow for the visualisation, discovery and analysis of any data records. Regardless of their type (e.g., documents, people, specimens, websites, etc), data records can be easily georeferenced with UTM coordinates. This allows the system to include traditional and non-traditional data types in spatial overlays and analyses. These data can be visualised on maps using the Map Explorer application or viewed as embedded map images anywhere within the system. This capability also allows all data types to be located ('discovered') using the unique visual search engine technology built into the Map Explorer application. Additionally, non-image-based GIS-based spatial data analyses can be undertaken on the fly.
The BERDS project team strives to provide a comprehensive and thorough resource base through the continued aggregation of new data and through the enhancement of the system's usability. The system is designed to allow multiple organisations, working as 'data providers' to easily contribute their own data and resources to the system, using only a web browser.
BERDS Members have access to their own customised Map Explorer Application, site monitoring system, private library catalog database and more. [Learn More]
To learn how your organisation can contribute data to this important initiative, please contact BERDS.
Learn more with BERDS demonstrations and tutorials.
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