Malcolm Noonan (Carlow-Kilkenny, Green Party) | Oireachtas source

I thank Deputy O'Sullivan who, I know, has a huge interest in this area. The Department is responsible for implementing the Wildlife Acts and the birds and natural habitats regulations, the principal items of legislation underpinning the protection, conservation and restoration of nature and biodiversity in the State. In addition, the Department has responsibility for implementing a range of other EU nature legislation, including the EU regulations on invasive alien species.

The collection of biodiversity and species data is a central part of the scientific work carried out by the National Parks and Wildlife Service, NPWS, in the Department and there is substantial investment annually in surveys, scientific monitoring and data collection. This is achieved directly by NPWS staff work, programmes at national and regional level and via the many contracts issued each year by the science and biodiversity section of the NPWS to NGOs, specialist contractors, experts and academics in the field. The Department also supports a number of postgraduate projects in universities. The results from much of this work are published in the Irish wildlife manual series on the NPWS website. Included in the publications this year alone are works on marine habitats, surveys of squirrels and pine martens, breeding waders and coastal grasslands, and a European checklist of mosses and ferns. The NPWS, working with national experts, the contractor hosting the National Biodiversity Data Centre for the Heritage Council and colleagues in Northern Ireland, produces regional red lists for the island of Ireland, which catalogue species under threat.

In the course of its annual programme of work, the NPWS provides funding and other support towards gathering of biodiversity data. This includes, for example, research on impacts of climate change on biodiversity and the intrinsic links between these, a small grants scheme for specialist biodiversity recorders and biodiversity grants for local authorities, some of which are used to support locally-led biodiversity data collection.

In addition to work carried out directly by, or on contract for, the NPWS, the Department funds the Heritage Council, which operates the National Biodiversity Data Centre. The centre collates and disseminates biological data on a national level. Most biological data collected by the Department and many relevant State agencies that have a role in data collection is sent to the centre.

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