Dr. David Penman, Chair of the GBIF Governing Board, has officially welcomed CYTED and ISIS to Associate Participant status in GBIF.

CYTED is the Iberoamerican Programme for Science and Technology for Development, and it plays a key role in coordinating science activities between Latin America and the Iberian countries. There are two Secretariats: one in Madrid and one in Rio de Janeiro.

The International Species Information System (ISIS) has a key role in developing access to zoolgical information. Its mission is facilitate international collaboration in the collection and sharing of information on animals and their environments for zoos, aquariums and related organizations to serve institutional, regional and global animal management and conservation goals. Recently, ISIS implemented the new Zoological Information Management System (ZIMS), which will ultimately share some data via GBIF.

Both organisations have signed the MOU and their official start-dates are 28 April 2006 for CYTED and 6 June 2006 for ISIS.