EMBRACE project
Expanding Monitoring of Butterflies for Restoration And Conservation across Europe 2021-2026
Background
The European Butterfly Monitoring Scheme (eBMS) provides data that enables the production of the Grassland Butterfly Index (GBI), which is one of the key measures for assessing the status and trends of biodiversity in the European Union. It is now vital to maintain the momentum to sustain the eBMS network and continue to support BMS coordinators and volunteers in monitoring butterflies and streamlining the ongoing and regular updating of the GBI. This will enable all EU schemes to contribute to the centralized eBMS database and produce an annual update for the GBI. This is essential to build a sustainable basis for continuing to provide the EU with high-quality data to populate the EU Biodiversity Strategy 2030 Dashboard; to contribute to the EU Sustainable Development Reports (Guillaume Lafortune, et al. 2024), and to inform policy and implementation of pollinator recovery (European Commission: DG-Env 2020 EU Pollinators Initiative).
The EMBRACE project
EMBRACE is a new project funded by the EU Directorate General for the Environment in 2025-26 to expand butterfly monitoring across Europe, building capacity, strengthening the monitoring network and updating butterfly indicators with recent data. This project will continue the work done during previous projects, SPRING and ABLE, based on improving the eBMS network and reinforcing the butterfly monitoring database. Based on the knowledge and recommendations from those previous projects, EMBRACE will secure a further step on consolidating eBMS.
Overall aim of the project
The overall objectives of the EMBRACE project are to:
- update the European Grassland Butterfly Index for the period 2021-2025;
- build further capacity to help achieve a more sustainable network of national citizen science-based butterfly monitoring schemes in all EU Member States (MSs) to underpin the calculation of butterfly abundance indicators;
support national eBMS coordinators to collect field data in 2025 and 2026 and encourage Member States to support eBMS coordinators in the longer term (to complement those MSs already doing so).
Partners EMBRACE
EMBRACE is led by the De Vlinderstichting (Dutch Butterfly Conservation) and involves several partners: UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (UKCEH), Butterfly Conservation Europe (BCE) and Butterfly Conservation UK (BC-UK) The project is funded by a service contract from the European Union DG Environment (EC-ENV/2024/NP/0040: GRASSLAND BUTTERFLY INDICATOR AND EUROPEAN BUTTERFLY MONITORING SCHEME UPDATE (2021-2026))
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