The Mexican National Biodiversity and Ecosystem Degradation Monitoring System

The UN sustainable development goals urge to achieve sustainable development in its economic, social and environmental dimensions. This international agenda advocates sustainable use of ecosystems and arresting and reversing land degradation and biodiversity loss. The lack of relevant, standardized and up-to-date data to monitor ecosystem change challenges to achieve this. Thus, an integrated, comprehensive resource-efficient approach is crucial to monitor ecosystems change. We introduce the recently initiated Mexican National Biodiversity and Ecosystem Degradation Monitoring System and examine three essential components to establish this national system. These components are: (i) a common scientific framework embracing the system's structure; (ii) a set of inter-institutional agreements and arrangements based on financial, technical and field capacities; and (iii) a cost-efficient working plan to ensure continuous national data gathering. The system will support data and information driven decision-making for national and international needs.