IWG3/2
Developing people indicators
Report from first meeting of the People Indicators Task Group
The draft Scottish Biodiversity Strategy ‘Biodiversity Matters’ recognises that any framework
for action to promote the conservation, enhancement and sustainable use of biodiversity
needs to include people at its heart. This is reflected in the second aim of the draft strategy:
 To raise awareness of the many benefits of biodiversity by significantly increasing
the number and range of people contributing to its conservation and enhancement.
Monitoring and reporting the progress of the strategy therefore must include measures of the
state of people’s understanding of, and engagement with, biodiversity, and the draft SBS
acknowledges the need to develop ‘social indicators’ during 2003. The Indicators Working
Group (IWG) of the Scottish Biodiversity Forum has established a People Indicators Task
Group (PITG), bringing together arrange of interested organisations, has been established to
lead work to develop people indicators.
The PITG has agreed a series of tasks to work towards its primary objective of establishing a
candidate list of people indicators to take back to the IWG. These are;
1. Establishing a clear purpose and scope for people indicators;
2. Reviewing the Scottish Executive’s ‘Scoping for Indicators’ study against the monitoring
requirements of the SBS;
3. Working with the Implementation groups to link the indicator set to their key objectives;
4. Working with other partners to identify new sources of information/data;
5. Achieving wide involvement in the development of indicators;
This paper gives an update on progress with these tasks.
1. Establishing a clear purpose and scope for people indicators.
Following discussion of guidance from the IWG, the PITG agreed that the following
should be considered in developing people indicators:
 headline indicators should primarily be indicators of ‘state’;
 the indicator set should allow reporting of the progress of the strategy;
 indicators should communicate a message – and need to have relevance/resonance
with a wide audience;
 the indicator set should help set strategic targets, focussing attention on key issues;
 there should be equal balance between ecological and people indicators;
 8 - 10 headline indicators is about right – but these could be aggregated from a larger
number of measures, perhaps linked to monitoring of the Implementation plans;
 the SBS indicator set should link to other relevant indicators – sustainable
development, environmental justice, quality of life.
2. Reviewing the Scottish Executive’s ‘Scoping for Indicators’ study against the monitoring
requirements of the SBS.
The group have examined objectives with regard to people and biodiversity set out in the
strategy, and started to look at some ways in which progress towards these aims could be
measured. Initial thoughts were:
 The second aim of the Strategy can be broken down into 3 key areas;
1. raising awareness of biodiversity and its benefits;
2. increasing the number of people contributing to biodiversity conservation;
3. increasing the range of people contributing to biodiversity conservation.
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 Monitoring of progress needs to go beyond measuring ‘awareness’ and look at how
increased awareness leads to increased action.
 Integrated action is emphasised throughout the strategy – some measure of how this
is progressing in needed.
 While the LBAP officers network is one possible mechanism to assess local
involvement, but there needs to be more consistency in officer activity, a lot of
biodiversity action occurs outwith LBAP network.
 Business is an important sector in the Strategy – but any monitoring of biodiversity and
business must include both large and small enterprises.
 Environmental standards may be useful in monitoring business – but are currently not
sufficiently linked to biodiversity conservation.
 An important factor that will assist in developing indicators is for the implementation
groups to set out clear key objectives fro people and biodiversity in their work.
Four key areas for biodiversity and people were identified in the strategy;
 communities and local community action;
 education/awareness;
 involvement of business;
 integration of biodiversity into wider plans and strategies.
These could form the basis of 4 headline indicators that bring together data sets which
examine involvement and action within these sectors.
A wide range of indicator sets and data, both current and in development, were reviewed
by the ‘Scoping for Indicators’ study, some of which could form part of the final indicator
set. Other issues identified in the study that are relevant to the development of indicators
are;
 ensure that the indicator sets reflects the important issues - not just those that we
have available data for;
 while existing data sets should be used where possible – further work is needed on
data availability and consistency;
 opportunities to link with, and influence, new data sets should be followed up – these
include the biodiversity duty in Nature Conservation Act, Strategic Environmental
Assessment and PANs on Open Space and Vacant/derelict land.
Further work to link data currently available against the Strategy will be carried out as
work on the Implementation Plans progresses.
3. Working with the Implementation groups to link the indicator set to their key objectives.
The PITG has good links with the Urban Implementation Group and the Advisory Group
on Communication and Education, two groups. The Cross-cutting issues group of the
Rural Working Group are developing actions relating to people aspects of biodiversity in
Scotland’s countryside (recreation and access, sustainable tourism etc). Further links with
this group are being sought. The marine group perhaps has less overlap with people
indicators, but a link should be established nonetheless.
4. Working with other partners to identify new sources of information/data.
This is being addressed by members of the PITG. A spreadsheet setting out the
monitoring requirements of the Strategy, and possible measures against these, will be
used to record data sets that could be used in developing indicators.
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5. Achieving wide involvement in the development of indicators.
The PITG agreed that involvement in shaping the indicator set should involve a range of
organisations, but the these would overlap significantly with those involved in other
aspects of the SBS. Both the Urban and Marine Working groups are planning stakeholder
events later this year to develop their Implementation plans. The Urban group has agreed
to include discussion on indicators/monitoring at their events. The marine group has an
event planned for the 20th October, and will be contacted to examine how indicators could
be included in this.
The Rural group already includes a very wide range of organisations, and thought on how
to link with their programme is needed.
6. The next steps
It was agreed that the group would work on the following before the next meeting;
 Look more closely at the messages and monitoring requirements of the strategy - what
are the key issues that need to be addressed through the action plans if the strategy is
to have a positive impact – and what measures would indicate progress?
 Identify data sets/information exists that could be used to develop these measures
 Identify new data/information that could be generated, both through the strategy or
related processes, that could be used to develop these measures
 Continue to develop partnership with the Working Groups.
Scott Ferguson
6th August 2003
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