What does it really cost to monitor biodiversity across Europe, and is it worth it? Those were the central questions addressed by Dr Tom Breeze (University of Reading) in a recent talk delivered to the Joint Nature Conservation Committee (JNCC), drawing on findings from the MAMBO and EuropaBon projects.

Europe's biodiversity is in serious decline, and while EU policy increasingly demands action, the monitoring data needed to underpin that action remains patchy, underfunded, and unevenly distributed across member states. Dr Breeze outlined the structural reasons behind this gap - from short-term funding cycles that make it impossible to retain specialist staff, to the growing rarity of taxonomic expertise, to the persistent misconception that citizen science comes for free.

Watch the full talk here.