1. Who is involved and what are their roles?
The Scottish Wildlife Trust and The Royal Zoological Society of Scotland as joint licence holders will lead the project. This includes sourcing, importing and releasing the beavers on-site as well as overall project management including stakeholder and community liaison, access to monitoring information, visitor management, education and raising a minimum of £750,000 to support the trial.
As site-owner, the Forestry Commission Scotland will be closely involved in practicalities of site and visitor management as well as contribute to the project management and monitoring.
As part of the licence conditions, Scottish Natural Heritage will provide independent monitoring and will report directly to the Scottish Government on the trial against the success/failure criteria from evidence and information gathered.
There are two tiers of project management - the Beaver Steering Group and the Beaver Project Team.
The Scottish Beaver Trial Steering Group is chaired by Allan Bantick and is responsible for:
planning, consultation and national overview, promoting the aims of the Scottish Beaver Trial, designing the framework for the project, directing the Project Team, and, maintaining a channel of communication with the Scottish Government for the exchange of information and for the resolution of issues that may arise. The Group will report every six months to Scottish Government on project progress.
The Scottish Beaver Trial Project Team is chaired by Simon Jones, Project Manager, Scottish Beaver Trial and is responsible for:
planning, implementation and reporting of the beaver trial, importing, quarantining, releasing and monitoring of the beavers and production of promotional and visitor materials. The Project Team will report each month to the Steering Group on project implementation progress