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GBIF DIGIT 2005-06 Seed Money Prioritization e-conference
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GBIF Seed Money Prioritization DIGIT - Electronic Conference (May 25 – June 1, 2005)
 Guidelines for participants and
contributors
Register for the e-conference
Background to the e-conference
The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) invites you to take part in an electronic conference: GBIF Seed Money Prioritization – DIGIT which will run from May 25 – June 1, 2005.
In comparison to the expected demand, the funds available from GBIF to support digitization activities in 2005-2006 are extremely limited. If the 2005-2006 DIGIT Seed money program’s goal, as recommended by the GBIF Third Year Review, is to produce quality data sets that are rich enough and have enough geographic coverage to demonstrate to the scientific community, politicians and funding agencies the value of the global digitization effort these awards will have to be extremely focused and will need concentrate on digitization activities targeted at specific taxonomic groups and have very specific goals. This does not mean that the taxonomic groups or the goals selected for this round of funding will be the same for future funding competitions. In fact, it is expected that the emphasis will change as the GBIF digitization prioritization plan is developed.
The DIGIT Science Sub-Committee, at its April 21-22, 2005 meeting in Brussels, considered possible criteria for the selection of the target taxonomic group and endorsed the following:
- The resulting digitized observational or specimen based data sets need to
have a clear application in support of a major international conservation
initiative
- Digitization of this data increases the value of current GBIF data
coverage by filling in taxonomic and geo-spatial gaps
- The proposed taxonomic group should meet all of the following
criteria.
- Is well represented in a large number of collections or observational
data sets
- Has a broad global range
- Is of significant economic importance
- Is of significant conservation concern
- Accessible digitized specimen information is urgently needed to answer
specific scientific and taxonomic questions
As a starting point for the dialogue, the DIGIT Science Sub-Committee
also suggested that pollinators particularly bees (Hymenoptera,
Apoidea) would be one group that would meet these criteria and the
resulting data sets would make a valuable contribution to the:
"International Pollinators Initiative (IPI)”.
As a starting point for the dialogue, the DIGIT Science Sub-Committee
also suggested that pollinators particularly bees (Hymenoptera,
Apoidea) would be one group that would meet these criteria and the
resulting data sets would make a valuable contribution to the:
"International Pollinators Initiative (IPI)”. These data sets would
help address the lack of taxonomic information about one group of
pollinators and support the CBD’s “Agricultural Biodiversity –
International Initiative for the Conservation and Sustainable Use of
Pollinators”,
“The
African Pollinator Initiative” and
“The Sao Paulo Declaration on Pollinators”.
All of these initiatives identify the need for additional taxonomic
information; in particular the need to repatriate data from the many of
the larger collections in the developed world (particularly type
information) so this information is accessible to scientists in the
developing world. The DIGIT seed money funds targeted at this group of
pollinators would make a very significant contribution to furthering
the various pollinator initiatives.
Conference Moderator
The Conference Moderator will be Chuck Miller, Chief Information Officer, Missouri Botanical Garden.
Monitoring the e-conference
The e-conference will address these questions:
- Are there other taxonomic groups
that meet the criteria listed?
- If so, for what groups would
the investment of GBIF DIGIT seed money have the greatest short term value
for biodiversity science?
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