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 to monitor butterflies and streamline the ongoing and regular updating of the GBI. This will enable all EU schemes to contribute to the centralized eBMS database and the production of 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
EPIC Butterfly is a new project funded by the EU Directorate General for the Environment in 2025-26 to strengthen the para-taxonomic capacity to monitor butterflies in EU Member States and improve their ability to run a Pollinator Monitoring Scheme. The project is one of three EPIC projects being funded by the EU; the others are on bees and hoverflies being led respectively by the University of Mons and the University of Alicante.
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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