Turning biodiversity data into action: introducing BON in a Box

Figure 1 Griffith et al. 2026: “BON in a Box can help inform monitoring efforts by prioritizing sampling areas and assessing biodiversity change by executing complex workflows that generate EBVs and indicators from raw data.”

Tracking progress towards global biodiversity goals increasingly depends on countries’ ability to turn diverse, fragmented data into meaningful indicators. Yet for many, there remains substantial technical, logistical, and capacity barriers to doing this well.

A newly published paper in BioScience introduces BON in a Box, an open and collaborative platform developed by the Group on Earth Observations Biodiversity Observation Network (GEO BON) to help address these challenges. BON in a Box is designed to support biodiversity monitoring, indicator calculation, and reporting in a way that is transparent, reproducible, and adaptable to national and local contexts.

Why indicator calculation is so hard in practice

Under the Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF), countries are required to report against a growing suite of headline, component, and complementary indicators. These indicators span biodiversity from genes to ecosystems and are intended to track progress towards ambitious targets for 2030 and beyond.

In practice, calculating them is far from straightforward. Data are often scattered across institutions and formats, methods are embedded in academic papers with limited access to usable code, and capacity to build and maintain complex workflows is uneven across countries and organisations. At the same time, many countries are rightly concerned about data sovereignty, transparency, and the risks of relying on black-box tools that are difficult to interrogate or adapt.

With national reports due under tight timelines, these challenges risk becoming a bottleneck to effective implementation of the GBF’s monitoring framework.

What is BON in a Box?

BON in a Box is an open-source platform that helps users convert biodiversity data into essential biodiversity variables (EBVs) and policy-relevant indicators using fully documented, community-contributed analysis pipelines.

At its core, BON in a Box provides a pipeline engine that allows users to run end-to-end analytical workflows, from raw data to EBVs and indicators, without manually stitching together scripts or software environments. Pipelines are modular, transparent, and reusable, and can combine tools written in different programming languages.

From genes to ecosystems: what can BON in a Box do?

The paper highlights a growing suite of pipelines already available within the platform, illustrating how BON in a Box can support a wide range of monitoring needs.

These include:

• Species distribution models, used to estimate changes in species’ ranges and underpin multiple GBF indicators

• Connectivity metrics, such as the Protected Connected Index (ProtConn), which help assess progress towards well-connected protected area networks

• Genetic diversity indicators, including the GBF headline indicator on the proportion of populations with effective population sizes above critical thresholds

By standardising how these analyses are run, documented, and shared, BON in a Box aims to reduce duplication of effort while improving comparability and transparency across countries and regions.

Looking ahead: scaling up access and impact

The authors outline an ambitious vision for the future of BON in a Box. Planned developments include improving usability, expanding the range of EBVs and indicators covered, and better integration with CBD reporting mechanisms. These developments position BON in a Box as more than just a technical tool. It is a step towards a more coordinated, open, and equitable global biodiversity observation system, that supports countries not only to report on biodiversity change, but to act on it.

Learn more

You can read the full paper or explore the platform by following the links below.