Guidance for use of Data Entry Module of IUCN Contributions for Nature platform

Prepared by: IUCN Contributions Platform Strategic Initiative, Gland, Switzerland

I. Introduction

a. Background

The 2011 “One Programme Charter” established a mandate for IUCN to deliver its Quadrennial Programme in a way that encompasses contributions from all components of the Union – Members, National and Regional Committees, Commissions, and Secretariat. However, to date there has been no mechanism to allow documentation of such contributions.

The Nature 2030 IUCN Programme addresses this by mandating development of a platform to allow such documentation. Specifically, it establishes that “We will create a digital platform where all parts of the Union can voluntarily share their planned and realised contributions to meeting the Impact Targets as well as towards global policy targets such as the post- 2020 global biodiversity framework and the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. This mechanism to document, and ultimately report on, contributions from the IUCN membership, National and Regional Committees, Commissions and Secretariat must be as light as possible (otherwise it will not be used), build on available information, be spatially explicit, be considerate of restrictions and reservations to share such information, provide maximal benefits to all users, and yield the most informative documentation possible. By doing this we can truly show the strength of the Union.” (Section 8, page 21).

Over 2021, the IUCN Director General convened a Strategic Initiative to develop this Contributions for Nature platform, as documented at https://www.iucn.org/about/senior-management/director-general/iucn-strategic-initiatives/contributions-nature-initiative. The operational platform comprises three distinct but interacting modules:

i. Data Entry Module.

This is the portal for allowing IUCN constituents to document the places where they are undertaking or planning to undertake conservation or restoration actions over the timeframe 2021 – 2030. It is accessible only with IUCN login credentials, from across the IUCN constituency.

ii. Validation Module.

This is the portal for allowing validation of plausibility of potential contributions documented in the Data Entry Module. It is accessible only to a defined set of users in the IUCN Regional Offices.

iii. Visualisation Module.

This is the platform for public display of the potential contributions towards global goals for nature (initially, biodiversity goals in terms of extinction risk reduction, and climate change mitigation goals in terms of carbon sequestration), as documented by IUCN constituents, individually and in aggregation, and visible to the world at large.

b. Objectives

This guidance document is intended to support IUCN constituents in use of the Data Entry Module. Its audience is therefore the entire IUCN constituency: representatives of IUCN Members (states, government agencies, sub- national governments, indigenous peoples’ organisations, national and international non-governmental organisations, affiliates), participants in IUCN National and Regional Committees, IUCN Commission Members, and IUCN Secretariat staff.

II. Guidance

a. Overarching considerations

In establishing the mandate for development of the Contributions for Nature platform, the Nature 2030 IUCN Programme emphasised six required characteristics for the platform. These are addressed as follows:

i. It must “be as light as possible (otherwise it will not be used)”.

This is addressed by minimising the required data to document contributions in the Data Entry Module. The only data which an IUCN constituent needs to enter to allow inclusion of their contribution in the platform are a) a polygon documenting where their conservation or restoration action is being undertaken on the ground, and b) a name for the contribution. A number of other fields are available and recommended, but not required, to keep the system as light as possible.

ii. It must “build on available information”.

This is addressed by drawing from two major databases about sites relevant to conservation in supporting spatial data entry by IUCN constituents: the World Database on Protected Areas (https://www.protectedplanet.net/en) and World Database of Key Biodiversity Areas (https://www.keybiodiversityareas.org/). In addition, in the Visualisation Module, contributions towards global goals for reducing biodiversity loss are reported in terms of the Species Threat Abatement and Restoration metric based on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (https://www.iucnredlist.org/assessment/star), and contributions towards global goals for mitigating climate change are reported in terms of carbon sequestration based on the Restoration Barometer (https://infoflr.org/bonn-challenge-barometer).

iii. It must “be spatially explicit”. The entire premise of the Contributions

for Nature platform is that it be based first and foremost on spatial data, documenting the places where IUCN constituents are undertaking or plan to undertake conservation or restoration actions. The primary data entry screen in the Data Entry Module is spatial, and documentation of a polygon is one of the only two required data elements for data entry.

iv. It must “be considerate of restrictions and reservations to share such

information”. To use the platform, IUCN constituents must give IUCN permission to store, aggregate, transform, and display their data, because otherwise their contributions cannot be documented in the Visualisation Module. However, IUCN constituents have an “opt-in” choice of whether or not to give permission to IUCN to allow reposting or redistribution of their data onto third-party platforms.

v. It must “provide maximal benefits to all users”. The Contributions for

Nature platform is designed to provide benefits to IUCN constituents across scales, specifically: a) allowing individual constituents document their potential contributions towards global targets for nature in a given place; b) supporting networking and establishment of partnerships; c) supporting planning, reporting, communications, and resource mobilisation within organisations and further afield; d) advancing action planning to fill gaps at national or regional level; e) establishing a basis for monitoring of delivery of actual contributions by 2030 and beyond; f) documenting the overall potential contributions of the IUCN “One Programme” towards global goals for nature.

vi. It must “yield the most informative documentation possible”. This is

achieved by presenting, in the visualisation module, documentation of individual and aggregate contributions towards global goals for biodiversity (derived from application of the Species Threat Abatement and Restoration metric to data documented by IUCN constituents) and climate change mitigation (derived from application of the Restoration Barometer’s carbon calculator to data documented by IUCN constituents). Associated data (eg budgets, numbers of staff and beneficiaries) are also presented for individual and aggregate contributions.

All modules and constituent elements of the Contributions for Nature will be available in EN (English), FR (French), and ES (Spanish), the three official languages of IUCN.

b. Log-in screen

All that is necessary at the log-in screen is for the IUCN constituent to enter their IUCN constituent user name and password. This should be the same user name and password used in all other IUCN systems. If you are having trouble remembering your IUCN credentials, please visit https://portals.iucn.org/union/recover-account.

All focal points of IUCN Members, all IUCN Commission members, and all IUCN Secretariat staff have IUCN credentials, as do many additional staff of IUCN Member organisations. If you are an IUCN constituent (eg staff of an IUCN Member organisation) but do not have IUCN credentials, please contact the Membership Focal Point for your region (details at https://www.iucn.org/regions), who can assign you with credentials accordingly.

c. Data Entry Module landing screen

The landing screen for the Data Entry Module has five elements:

i. A top-bar shows your user name and the IUCN constituent

organisation(s) with whom you are affiliated. This top bar also includes the EN-FR-ES translation across the three IUCN official languages.

ii. The main panel is a map interface, showing a global map showing all

contributions which you have documented to date. You can examine specific regions by zooming in and out of this map, scrolling with your mouse, or typing a place (eg country, region, city) into the “Find address or place” box. You change the default background map by clicking on the four-box icon.

iii. A search box at top of the left-hand panel allows you to search contributions which you have documented to date by contribution names, or by the names of IUCN constituent individuals or organisations tagged as partners with you in making these contributions.

The search will provide autofill options as you type the letters of the name you are searching for.

iv. Most of the rest of the left-hand panel provides a list of those

contributions which you have documented to date, separating those which are awaiting validation from those which have already been validated. If you have documented many contributions, you may need to scroll up and down to find a given single contribution. You may edit or delete any of these at any time, by using the edit or delete icons associated with each contribution.

v. Finally, this screen provides a large orange oval button for “+ Add

Contribution”. Clicking this takes you to the spatial data entry screen.

d. Spatial data entry

As established by the Nature 2030 IUCN Programme, spatial data provides the core of the Contributions for Nature platform. As such, the first data entry screen is dedicated to allowing an IUCN constituent to document the sites where they are undertaking (or are planning to undertake) conservation actions over the time period 2021–2030. Spatial documentation is required for entry of a potential contribution.

Please keep in mind that the Contributions for Nature platform is designed to allow documentation of potential contributions from conservation or restoration actions on the ground, not from policy engagement actions spanning entire countries or regions. While there is no automatic size limit, the median area of Key Biodiversity Areas is 100 sq km (that for protected areas is similar). Of course, there are a few very large conservation and restoration programmes (eg >10,000 sq km), but these are relatively unusual and mainly focused in high latitude countries.

Early feedback from across the IUCN constituency emphasised the importance of allowing multiple pathways for spatial data entry, to allow for the very wide variation in capacity for handling spatial data across the IUCN constituency. Thus, you can document the sites where you are delivering or will deliver contributions using five different approaches:

i. Upload of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) data. If you have

existing GIS data documenting the polygons where your conservation and restoration actions are underway or planned, you can upload them by drag-and-drop directly here. Shapefiles should be zipped (.zip) so as to reduce file sizes and upload times.

ii. Selection of Key Biodiversity Areas (KBAs). More than 16,000 KBAs

have been identified through national processes around the world, following the IUCN Global Standard

(https://portals.iucn.org/library/node/46259), and documented in the World Database of Key Biodiversity Areas (https://www.keybiodiversityareas.org). Many IUCN constituents work in supporting the safeguard of these sites which contribute significantly to the global persistence of biodiversity, and so the Contributions for Nature platform provides a pathway to select one or more KBAs as the spatial data to document a given contribution.

This can be done by selecting “Key Biodiversity Areas” from the “Select a sites layer” menu, which displays all KBAs onto the map interface. You can then select the specific KBA(s) in question by either zooming in on the map, or by using the “Select Country” menu to zoom to the country in question, and then selecting the site where you are making contributions either from the “Select Site(s)” drop-down menu or directly from the map.

iii. Selection of protected areas (PAs). More than 300,000 PAs have

been identified through national processes around the world, following the IUCN Global Standard (https://portals.iucn.org/library/node/9243), and documented in the World Database on Protected Areas (https://www.protectedplanet.net/en). Many IUCN constituents work in supporting the management of these sites, and so the Contributions for Nature platform provides a pathway to select one or more PAs as the spatial data to document a given contribution.

This can be done by selecting “Protected Areas” from the “Select a sites layer” menu, which displays all PAs onto the map interface. You can then select the specific PA(s) in question by either zooming in on the map, or by using the “Select Country” menu to zoom to the country in question, and then selecting the site where you are making contributions either from the “Select Site(s)” drop-down menu or directly from the map.

iv. Drawing polygons on screen. If you do not have GIS data

documenting the polygon where you are undertaking (or anticipate undertaking) your contribution, and are not working in an already- documented KBA or PA, you can still document your contributions by drawing one or more polygons on screen using the drawing menu on the map. You will want to zoom in to the appropriate region or country to do this, and may want to use different background map (eg to show roads, topography, etc) to help you in drawing your polygon.

v. Entering points with associated areas on screen. Even if you do not

know the approximate boundaries of the places where you are undertaking (or anticipate undertaking) your contribution, you can still document your contributions by entering a point and an associated area (ie a circle). You will want to zoom in to the appropriate region or country to do this, and may want to use different background map (eg to show roads, topography, etc) to help you in entering the centre point, and then use the menu under the point drawing tool to select the buffer (ie the diameter of the circle).

Once the polygon(s) required has been selected, you can then click the “Next” button to move to the next data entry screen.

e. Other data entry

The next screen allows documentation of supporting information about your contribution, in a variety of formats. It is important to emphasise that most of these data fields are not required in allowing IUCN constituents to document their contributions. In total, this screen allows documentation of seven types of data:

i. Contribution name

The only other required field in the Data Entry Module is for a name of the contribution. This is a free text field. Typical contribution names will be the name of the project or site in question. Names can be provided in any language which uses Roman characters. The potential contribution cannot be submitted with this field blank. Please do not use dummy names (eg “test contribution”) and of course avoid using any inappropriate or offensive language in contribution names.

The intent of the contribution name field is to document the contribution with a unique and relevant identifier.

ii. Contribution dates

The timeframe of the Contributions for Nature platform (for its Phase I) is 2021 – 2030, consistent with the IUCN Programme. As such, the start date field is pre-populated as 1 January 2021, and the end date field as 31 December 20 29. You can change these dates to be any time before the end of 2030 for the start date, and any time after the beginning of January 2021 for the end date. Documentation of potential contributions outside of this time window is not possible, ie either contributions which were completed before 1 January 2021 (historical contributions) or contributions which are anticipated to start after 31 December 2029 (long-term future contributions).

The intent of the contribution dates fields is to allow documentation of the timeframes over which contributions are being implemented. For future phases of the Contributions for Nature platform development, it is also anticipated that mechanisms for tracking change over time will be incorporated, which will necessarily draw directly from these date fields.

iii. Documentation of actions (threat abatement, conservation,

restoration)

Documentation of potential contributions is enriched by documentation of the actions being undertaken. This documentation is provided in the form of three non-mutually exclusive drop-down menus, for abatement of threats (https://www.iucnredlist.org/resources/threat-classification- scheme), conservation actions (https://www.iucnredlist.org/resources/conservation-actions- classification-scheme), and restoration actions (https://infoflr.org/bonn- challenge-barometer). Documentation of one or more restoration actions automatically documents class 2.3 (“habitat & natural process

restoration”). Documentation of actions is recommended but not required.

The intent of the documentation of actions is to shed light on what conservation and restoration actions are taking place in implementing the contribution in question. In addition, the documentation of threats being mitigated allows comparison with the threats active in threatening the species which occur in the place in question (from the Species Threat Abatement and Restoration metric) and the documentation of restoration actions allows assessment of contributions towards climate change mitigation using the carbon calculator from the Restoration Barometer.

iv. Budget documentation

You can document your current annual budget for a given current contribution, as well as your total annual budget required for a potential contribution (documentation of current annual budget as larger than total annual budget is not possible in the Data Entry Module). This is a numeric field; you can enter data to the level of precision appropriate to your own budget data. Data entry is through drop-down menus of budget bands, with an additional numeric field in case an IUCN constituent seeks to enter a more precise or larger budget. Documentation of budgets is recommended but not required.

There are several rationales for documenting current and total budgets. At the level of individual contributions, this allows the Contributions for Nature platform to be used as a resource mobilisation and fundraising tool by the individual IUCN constituent making those contributions. At the more aggregated level, it allows better documentation of both the resources available for and needed for conservation at national, regional, and global scales, which is important information for helping to narrow the conservation finance gap more broadly.

v. Staff and beneficiaries documentation

You can document the number of women and men staff working or planned to work on your potential contribution; and also the number of women and men direct beneficiaries of the potential contribution. Fields for total staff and total beneficiaries are automatically populated from the sum of women and men, or can be entered directly if you do not have sex disaggregated data. Data entry is through numeric fields. Beneficiaries are those people who are directly targeted by the contribution and as such are expected to directly benefit from its activities/outputs/outcomes; e.g. by receiving training, technical assistance, access to materials, supplies, or financing. Documentation of staff and beneficiaries is recommended but not required.

The rationale for documenting numbers and sex differentiation of staff and beneficiaries is that it is important to show both the level of conservation-related employment, and the breadth of beneficiaries from conservation.

vi. Tagging

If you are undertaking your contribution in partnership with other IUCN constituents (eg as implementing or executing agencies, donors, etc), you have the option to “tag” them when documenting a potential contribution in the Data Entry Module. You can tag IUCN constituent institutions or individuals by typing their names in the search box; this will provide autofill options as you type the letters of the name you are searching for. When you tag another IUCN constituent in the Data Entry Module, this generates an automated email to that constituent inviting them to confirm their partnership in the contribution in question. No data on individuals are made available in the Visualisation Module – the contributions of tagged individuals are presented in the Visualisation Module as those of the IUCN constituent organisation (eg IUCN Member, IUCN Commission, IUCN Secretariat) with which they are affiliated. Tagging of partner IUCN constituents is recommended but not required.

The rationales for contribution tagging are to ensure due credit for shared contributions, to support networking, and to avoid double counting when summing budget, staff, and beneficiary data.

vii. Other fields

Finally, you have the opportunity to enter a short narrative description of their potential contribution (in any language using Roman characters), to upload photographs, or to upload documents (eg reports or funding proposals).

The rationale for these other, narrative fields is to give you the opportunity to provide richer documentation associated with your contribution; these will be disseminated through the Visualisation Module associated with your contribution. However, the Contributions for Nature platform is primarily intended to be a spatial and quantitative one, rather than a narrative one, and so to provide full documentation of conservation successes, we suggest that you consider displaying this through the complementary PANORAMA platform (https://panorama.solutions/en).

f. Validation process

At the point at which an IUCN constituent clicks “submit” for documentation of their potential contribution in the Data Entry Module, an automated email is generated to a pre-determined email list of IUCN Secretariat validators based on the IUCN operational region in which the potential contribution is located. Where a single potential contribution spans more than one region, validation emails will be sent to the validation email list for each region in question. The validator has two weeks to undertake the validation.

If the validator does not find the potential contribution as documented to be plausible, they have the responsibility to follow up with the IUCN constituent in question to diagnose the issue. Often, this will be the result of a simple data entry mistake, which the IUCN constituent can correct in the Data Entry Module and re-submit their corrected documentation for validation.

Occasionally, it may not be possible for the validator and the IUCN constituent in question to resolve plausibility of the potential contribution. In such rare cases, the issue will be escalated within the IUCN Secretariat for resolution.

Once the validation has been completed, an automated email informs the IUCN constituent of this, and the potential contribution in question is published onto the Visualisation Module.