BIOTIK: A knowledge sharing portal for managing biodiversity informatics

Launched in January 2005, BIOTIK is an initiative in biodiversity informatics looks at developing two knowledge bases of the tree species of Western Ghats, India and Northern Annamites of Lao PDR. These two areas are identified as hotspots of biodiversity in the region and the project aims at completely cataloguing all the tree species of these two areas. Initially, a multimedia based species identification software will be developed to identify tree species in these two areas which will eventually evolve in to comprehensive knowledge bases with digital herbariums, photographs of characters of the species (before and after flowering) and all relevant botanical and taxonomy related information. These knowledge bases will be available on the web (using SVG, PHP, MySQL) where one can identify the tree species, on CD/DVD-ROM's and also on simputers with local language support (Malayalam, Kannada and Lao). The target audience are the staff of the forest departments, buffer zone population and those involved in forest-community related projects like joint forest management. This initiative will not only help to consolidate the present knowledge available in terms of biodiversity but will also help to evolve indicators for biodiversity on the long run. On the other hand, the staff of the stakeholders like forest department will be trained and will be able to keep the knowledge base up-to-date whilst also gaining an intensive knowledge about what exactly they are taking care of. The implications can be quite scaling, from contributing to the global databases on taxonomy to facilitating participation of local population in conservation. More: BIOTIK Source: Post by Balasubramanian D at FOSS-PDI.

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