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Convention on Biological DiversityPlant Conservation Report Page 42TARGET 16:NETWORKS FOR PLANT CONSERVATION ACTIVITIESESTABLISHED OR STRENGTHENED AT NATIONAL,REGIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL LEVELSIntroductionNetworks supporting plant conservationactivities provide the means to shareprotocols and celebrate successes,exchange data, encourage professionaldevelopment of conservation specialists and buildcapacity of the plant conservation community.Organizations participating in such networkinginclude government agencies, museums, academicspecialists, botanic gardens and non-governmentalorganizations. Importantly, networks are notconstrained to follow any particular modeland often extend across political or sectoralboundaries to most effectively mobilize resourcesfor particular purposes. For smaller organizations,participating in networks provides a direct meansto contribute to larger projects, beneit from mutualexercises in building capacity and expertise. Forlarger organizations and government agencies,networks provide eficient means to coordinateprojects across large distances and aggregateobservations and results. The majority ofnetworks are self-organizing, arising in responseto needs and opportunities. Many differentmodels exist for networks, ranging from informal,sometimes transient, efforts to share informationor cooperate on speciic projects, to large nationaland international associations with paid staffand secretariats. Recently the concept of grids, ornetworks of networks, has also been recognized.For example, the Global Partnership for PlantConservation consists of a variety of partners,many of which are themselves networks. Makingprogress on many of the other ifteen targets ofthe GSPC depends upon strengthening existingnetworks or forming new ones. For example, thedevelopment, testing and sharing of protocolsfor plants conservation (Target 3) and trainingand increasing capacity for plant conservationthrough increasing numbers of workers (Target15) requires effective sharing among agenciesof information, resources and in some casespersonnel.Contribution of the TRAMIL 1 network to theimplementation of the GSPC (Photo: Sonia Lagos-Witte).1 www.rlbbotanica.orgProgressIn many respects the GSPC itself has been a grassrootsnetworking programme. Target 16 calls forthe establishment or strengthening of networks;GSPC is both a product of networking and hasfacilitated and strengthened networking asorganizations respond to the Strategy.The GSPC has been particularly effective ingenerating cross-sectoral networks. The botanicgardens community, organizations involved inthe Global Invasive Species Programme, FAO,Bioversity International and other geneticresource programmes, sustainable use initiatives,and the forestry sector are in communication andshare experiences relevant to the targets. Thisexchange has taken place at all levels. National andglobal networks and within-country cross sectoralnetworks have been generated or strengthened toimplement the GSPC.This effort has also catalysed networking amongherbaria, zoological parks and other organizationsthat might not previously have considered thatthey have a plant conservation role. Many regionalnetworks have focused on enhancing nationaland regional implementation of the Strategy. Thesymposium and workshop at the Latin American
Botanical Congress in Santo Domingo, DominicanRepublic, in June 2006 was a particularlynoteworthy activity that helped raise awarenessof, and promote national implementation of theGSPC in Latin American countries and supportthe development of a regional partnership forplant conservation in Latin America (AsociaciónLatinoamericana de Botánica and the GlobalPartnership for Plant Conservation). Othernetwork efforts were the organization of aworkshop in December 2005 in Bogota, Colombia,for botanic gardens in Latin America to developregional 2010 targets for Latin American botanicgardens (Asociación Latinoamericana y del Caribede Jardines Botánicos, BGCI, the Red Nacional deJardines Botánicos de Colombia and partners).Sharing experiences in plant conservation betweenUK and China at the Beijing Institute of Botany (Photo:Stella Simiyu).In Europe, effective cooperation is impossiblewithout the focussed cooperation of networksor working groups. Planta Europa, EuropeanCouncil for the Conservation of Fungi (ECCF),the European Native Seed ConservationNetwork (ENSCONET), European Committee forConservation of Bryophytes (ECCB) and the newlyestablished European Mycological Association(EMA) are just a few examples of cooperation forplant conservation in Europe. Through links withPlanta Europa, they are actively contributing tothe implementation of the European Strategy forPlant Conservation.FutureParties to the CBD should continue to nominatenational focal points and encourage theparticipation of a wide variety of sectors inachieving the targets of the GSPC. Approximatelya third of Parties have at this stage nominatedfocal points for the GSPC.Particularly important to the GSPC is the GlobalPartnership for Plant Conservation. As a keycomponent of the lexible coordinating mechanismfor the GSPC, the Partnership is encouraging andpromoting achievement of all targets. Advanceswill continue in electronic networking, and newtools are emerging such as social and professionalnetworking web sites, but access to these speciictools remains limited in many areas.The GSPC provides an entry point for thousands ofinstitutions to contribute to the implementationof the Convention on Biological Diversity. TheStrategy will continue to provide an active meansof engaging conservationists, scientists and civilsociety in a participatory programme where thecontributions of all are important.The Global Partnership for Plant Conservation -Networking to complete South Africa’s RedData List for PlantsAs described under Target 2, the South AfricanNational Biodiversity Institute has recentlycompleted assessing the conservation statusfor all 20,456 plant taxa that occur in SouthAfrica. The assessment was conducted inconstant collaboration with 169 botanistsand it cost $570,000. It is estimated that itis possible for a flora of around 20,000 plantspecies to be assessed over a period of fiveyears if three experienced botanists and twosupport staff work full time. Moreover, theexperience demonstrates that it is possible todo comprehensive conservation assessmentsfor all of the taxa within a highly diverse floraif dedicated individuals and financial resourcesare made available. Electronic herbaria, such asthe system developed by China, greatly assistin speeding up conservation assessments. Inaddition accurate spatial land cover informationis key for determining threats to species.Drosanthemum micans, a plant on South Africa'sRed Data list (Photo: Karoo Desert NBG).Plant Conservation ReportPage 43 Convention on Biological Diversity
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