Global & European Strategies for Plant Conservation
ESPC Target 1
A widely accessible working list of known plant species,
as a step towards a complete world flora
TARGET 1. CHECK LISTING
Information: Check-listing is an essential step in understanding the diversity of plants and fungi in each country and region, and as a base-line for assessing any changes or losses. The target will require the compilation and synthesis of existing knowledge, focussing on names and synonyms, and geographical distribution. Check-listing also requires long-term investment in taxonomic expertise and training. The GSPC estimates that there are 270,000 known plant species (with 900,000 scientific names). The European check-list will be dynamic and include, vascular plants, cryptogamic plants, and fungi. The list will include all species found in Europe, whether native or not, with a flag to indicate the level of threat (if any) they present as an invasive species. ‘Country distribution’ is taken to mean the presence or absence of a particular species but more detailed information can be included if available.
Targets: (for details of lead partners download pdf of ESPC)
GSPC target 1
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A widely accessible working list of known plant species, as a step towards a complete world flora. |
ESPC 1.1 |
A widely accessible dynamic working list of all known plant and fungi species (including bryophytes, lichen, algae & cultivated plants) available by 2010 for vascular plants and bryophytes and 2014 for other groups, as part of a world list, and including country distributions. |
ESPC 1.2 |
Alien plants annotated within the working list of plant species with a risk category (low risk, spreading but weedy, damaging ecosystem ‘transformers’). |
Actions to mitigate the effects of climate change: Where possible any national and regional checklists could indicate any species known to be at particular risk from the effects of climate change. The risk category of alien invasive species to include any available information on the effects of climate change to their distribution. |
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European Projects/Databases/Organisations:
Organisation |
Project/database |
On-line DB |
Euro+Med Plantbase |
Vascular plants : on-line database & information system for Europe and the Mediterranean |
yes |
Royal Botanic Garden Kew |
Vascular plants: World Checklist of Selected Plant Families |
yes |
Royal Botanic Garden Kew |
Electronic Plant Information Centre (ePIC) – database to search all of Kew’s digitised information in collections, checklists, publications (http://epic.kew.org/index.htm) |
yes |
Royal Botanic Garden Kew |
Vascular plants (incl. pteridophytes), bryophytes & algae: searchable DNA-C values database, currently has records for over 5,000 species (http://data.kew.org/cvalues/homepage.html) |
yes |
European Committee for the Conservation of Bryophytes (ECCB) |
Bryophytes: Checklists of European bryophytes available on-line
|
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European Mycological Association (EMA) |
Fungi: Hosts links to lists of national checklists of fungi, lichens and lichenicolous fungi and other mycological resources (http://www.euromould.org/) |
|
PGR Forum – Crop wild relative Information Service (CWRIS) |
Crop wild relatives: searchable on-line database of crop wild relatives in Europe with links to Euro+Med Plantbase |
yes |
International Association for Lichenology (IAL) |
Lichens: International organisation for the study and conservation of lichens (http://www.lichenology.org/) |
|
Federation of European Phycological Societies (FEPS) |
Algae: a forum for all European phycological societies and individuals to promote & enhance research, education, public awareness |
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Delivering Alien Species Inventories for Europe (DAISIE) |
Invasive species: Searchable taxonomic lists of alien species in Europe, including plants, bryophytes, fungi, and algae |
yes |
Link to case-studies/tool kits: (.pdf)
- European Bryophyte Checklists
- Tool-kit for Target 1 of the Global Strategy
- EDIT – European Distributed Institute of Taxonomy (also see target 15)
International Projects :
- Royal Botanic Garden Kew – ‘iPlants’ Project to coordinate activities under target 1 of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation
- Global Taxonomic Initiative of the CBD (http://www.cbd.int/gti/)
- International Plant Names Index (IPNI) – (http://www.ipni.org/)
- World Checklist of Cetrarioid Lichens (http://www.jrnl.ut.ee/lichenology/)