Getting it together for freshwater ecosystems

Today, thousands of bloggers across hundreds of counties will take part in Blog Action Day, an annual event to raise awareness about a single topic – this year focussed on freshwater.  An impressive list of participants – including Google, Greenpeace and the White House blog – will all post on a range of human rights, environmental, animal welfare and sustainability issues surrounding access to clean water.

We believe that BioFresh can lend an important voice to this discussion.  By creating a shared network of global freshwater biodiversity data, the project will better our understanding of the status and trends of freshwater ecosystems, and so allow effective conservation strategies to be planned.  This week’s post on a recent Nature article emphasised the pressing need for accurate biodiversity datasets in order to map the threats faced by freshwater ecosystems.

The value of this data lies solely in its use.  That’s why we are spearheading new and creative ways of engaging new users with BioFresh in order to encourage use of our open access data portals, and to raise awareness of the urgency of biodiversity loss from freshwater systems.  Whilst our focus is on biodiversity, the conservation of healthy freshwater ecosystems provides numerous beneficial services to humans – such as water security, clean drinking water and flood control.  Today’s Blog Action Day is about raising awareness of these benefits, and highlighting the numerous threats to freshwater ecosystems.  We at BioFresh are glad to be involved.

How to get involved:

• Register your blog at Blog Action Day to take part
• Publicise the event through email and social media
• Follow the global debate throughout the day

More information:

• Read more about freshwater biodiversity conservation at: The BioFresh site; The IUCN Freshwater Biodiversity Unit; and WWF Freshwater Conservation
• An excellent explanation of the potential for blogs to engender positive action at charity: water