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Former SSC Network Support Officer Andrew Rodrigues
completed a consultation for updating The IUCN Red List
Documentation Standards for plants. Network support staff
worked to update the Terms of Reference for IUCN SSC Red
List Authorities. A short report investigating how Specialist
Groups incorporate indigenous and traditional knowledge into
IUCN Red List assessments was compiled, and this
information was shared with Rosie Cooney, Chair of the
Sustainable Use and Livelihoods SG.
IUCN Red Listing capacity built through expanded
training programmes (Capacity developed to ensure
that The IUCN Red List Criteria are applied rigorously
and consistently to increase the credibility of The IUCN
Red List)
A three-day IUCN Red List Trainer certificate course is
now in place; targeting people with proven red listing skills and
who are responsible for managing IUCN Red List assessment
projects. A Training Trainers workshop was held in June 2013
to finalize the course content. Thirty one people are now
certified IUCN Red List Trainers.
Red List Assessor Training Workshops: Fourteen Red List
training workshops and sessions have been held since Sept.
2012, providing training for a range of ongoing assessment
projects, SSC Specialist Groups, national Red List projects,
and Red List Partners. A total of 282 people were trained.
Online Red List Training Course: The online IUCN Red List
course, Assessing Species’ Extinction Risk Using IUCN Red
List Methodology, was released in stages on TNC’s
Conservation Training website during the course of the year.
The course covers a range of topics including The IUCN Red
List Categories and Criteria, supporting Information for
assessments, SIS, and regional assessments. An exam was
released at the end of the year.
IUCN Red List Website: Training Pages:
The IUCN Red List website has been updated to include a
more focused series of separate web pages explaining all
aspects of IUCN Red List Training, see this link.
IUCN Red Listing capacity built through expanded training
programmes – Olivier Hasinger trained to be a Red List
assessor. Red List training was given to the Otter SG, provided
an information session on mammal IUCN Red List reassessments
to SSC attendees of the International
Mammalogical Congress and shared best practices and
lessons learned for Specialist Group operations to the Small
Carnivore SG. The SSC Chair’s office (Rachel Roberts) led
much of the work behind SSC Specialist Group Chair and Red
List Coordinator re-appointments in 2013; including updating
key documents such as the “Guidelines for Specialist Group
Chairs” and “Welcome to the SSC document”.
Amphibians: BAU continues to guide RLA members and
supervise interns as they undertake their respective species
assessments. Our first two institutional partnerships have
recently been established: with the Chengdu Institute of
Biology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CIB) and with
CONABIO of Mexico. We are actively discussing other
potential partnerships in Panama, Colombia, northern Central
America, the Caribbean and the Philippines.
BAU supported the re-structuring of the IUCN SSC Amphibian
Red List Authority (RLA into regional working groups, led by
Tier I RLA members, which are taking stewardship of
assessments in their respective regions. In support of the new
structure, we have collectively trained five interns and seven
Amphibian RLA members in the tools of The IUCN Red List
trade. Much of this training took place remotely.
However, a two-day training workshop in Sydney, Australia and
a five-day workshop in Chengdu, China also took place, as did
a one-day IUCN Red List training workshop in the context of
the Brazilian Congress of Herpetology (22–26 July 2013),
attended by 20 participants inclusive of researchers,
professors, students and government representatives.
MBU: Two Old Dominion University Red List Trainings were
held this year, with a total of nine participants from Old
Dominion University and one from Brown University. An
international training program is scheduled for 21 participants
from seven countries, including the United Arab Emirates,
Qatar, Bahrain, Kuwait, Iran, Jordan, and the United States.
The IUCN Red List is underpinned by cutting-edge
information management technologies (The information
technology infrastructure to support Species Strategic
Plan objectives is enhanced)
A number of developments involving SIS or the handling of
spatial data are underway or close to completion which will
greatly enhance the assessment process and handling of all
the data collected. These include:
• SIS bug fixing and feature improvements to facilitate the
assessment process based on requests from the Red List
Technical Working Group (RLTWG).
• Publication workflow being used by the Red List Unit to
manage the submission and publishing of assessments, this
will soon be made available to all users to track progress of
submissions to publication.
• Integrity checker has been re-worked and the new version is
in final testing, and the rules for what needs to be checked
are being entered in the system.
• The Use and Trade modules have been changed following
feedback from the RLTWG. A few minor changes still need
to be made before full migration to the new modules.
• A significant change in 2013 was the merger of the Birdlife
SIS and IUCN SIS versions. Now there is one SIS database
for both institutions, which save time and money on system
updates, and this will also make the process of publishing
new releases to the website more efficient and faster.
• Improvements in the handling of spatial data implemented
during 2013 now make it possible to update the Map
Browser and the main IUCN Red List website almost at the
same time. The systems for managing and displaying point
data (from specimens and observations) are under
development.
• Work has started to build the functionality to import data
from external databases (e.g. at Kew, SANBI, etc.) into SIS.
• Implementation of an online mapping tool (initially for
Report of the Global Species Programme Director
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