Developing communication tools for stakeholder engagement

There is increasing recognition that local community involvement in land and water management issues (i) aids better environmental decision making, (ii) enhances social, economic and environmental benefits, and (iii) increases a sense of ownership.

Through engagement with local community stakeholders in three different catchments (The Rivers Eden, Tarland and Dyfi), we are starting a process of developing prototype visualisation tools as part of the NERC pilot Environmental Virtual Observatory (EVO), to address the specific land and water management issues identified in each area. As such, local stakeholder groups are being invited to assist the EVO’s development and participate in local decision making alongside policy makers, government agencies and scientists.

Through this local collaboration, we will provide novel visualisation tools through which to communicate complex catchment science outcomes in ways that better meet end-user needs as well as facilitate a far broader participatory approach in environmental decision making. To this end a Local Landscape Visualisation Tool will be evolved across the life of the project that will reflect the needs and capabilities of a wide range of stakeholders. The tool will use the latest concepts and technologies to communicate with the public, with government agencies and scientists. This local toolkit will reside within a wider EVO platform that will include national datasets, models and state of the art cloud computer systems