Natural England - Research and Evidence
Research and Evidence
Natural England’s views and actions are based on the best available evidence and analysis. This page presents our current evidence projects and explains how and why we use evidence.
Current evidence projects
Natural England’s current research and monitoring projects, designed to meet our priority evidence needs, are described in the Live Evidence Register.
How we make our evidence available
We make our evidence available through a range of publications, maps and datasets.
Our Technical Publications page provides information on the different categories of research and evidence publications.
We provide monthly press releases announcing new evidence technical publications.
Why we need evidence
As an environmental delivery organisation, we rely on regularly updated monitoring and surveillance information. Monitoring helps us measure the impact of our work, while surveillance is carried out to assess the state of and trends in the natural environment.
We also commission research to generate new evidence where it is needed. For example, to help us better understand the changes that we are seeing in our natural environment or to assist the development of solutions that can be applied to address environmental problems.
The demands on our evidence base are huge, reflecting the breadth and complexity of our remit. Examples of Natural England activities that rely on sound evidence include:
Designing agri-environment options such as the new Uplands Entry Level Stewardship Scheme.
Providing advice on complex casework such as for major planning proposals like the Severn Barrage.
Developing authoritative reports on the State of the Natural Environment to inform policies and decisions both internally and externally.
How we plan our evidence work
Our Evidence Programme is planned and reviewed on an annual basis as part of the wider process that defines Natural England’s Corporate Plan. Within that process we gather feedback from Defra, our sponsor department, and from stakeholders. Steering this planning process, our Board also consider our specific evidence priorities each year (see 2009/10 board paper Evidence and Policy Priorities for Natural England 2009/10 
).
At a more detailed level, our plans are informed by our ongoing engagement with a range of stakeholders, many of whom work with us in partnership on a range of projects.
Our framework for Science, Research and Evidence is set out in Natural England Research Report NERR011