ecoBalade, Reconnecting People to Their Bioregion

Many studies have identified that people, the stories they tell (Prévot-Julliard et al. 2014) and the products they buy (Kesebir and Kesebir 2017) are getting more and more disconnected from nature. As a side effect, it is getting harder to understand the complexity of conservation issues (Zhang et al. 2014). The result (Pyle 2003) is an inexorable cycle of disconnection, apathy, and progressive depletion of awareness. Even though remarkable progress has been made by software technologies to help us to give names to plants, birds and animals, we need a deeper connection to our environment. By permitting exploration of an ecopath and the surrounding species (thanks to the identification keys), the new version of ecoBalade aims to reconnect people to people and nature. It provides a new way for public localities to put their natural heritage in the spotlight. We also believe that this new version will showcase the local bioregions (Pezzoli and Leiter 2016, Ebach et al. 2013) and will provide a key to understanding the imbrications of local biodiversity.