IABIN - Ecosystems Thematic Network

The Coordinating Institution for the Ecosystems Thematic Network is a Consortium led by NatureServe (USA). The members of the consortium are:

•     Centro Internacional para el Desarrollo Sostenible - CIDES (Panamá) (Panama)
•     Instituto de Investigación de Recursos Biológicos - Alexander Von Humboldt (Colombia)
•     Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales  (Argentina)
•     NatureServe (USA)
•     Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute - STRI (Panama) (Panama)
•     The Nature Conservancy - TNC (USA)

The ecosystem is the fundamental unit of resource management. Ecosystem maps are integrated planning tools that provide a record of the location and distribution of ecosystems within a management area. They create a framework for developing various site-specific uses.


Thematic Network Goal:

The objective of this Thematic Network is to implement an electronic and institutional network dedicated to regional ecosystem information that supports the decision making process. Ultimately, tools developed by the Network should allow the user to consult specimen, species and ecosystems databases in an integrated manner (in coordination with other Thematic Networks).



Objectives:

   1. Enhance the usefulness of ecosystem information for decision makers in government and civil society.
   2. Establish standards for providing access to information on ecosystems that is distributed among multiple institutions.
   3. Establish a hemispheric system for cross-referencing different ecosystem classifications.
   4. Integrate ecosystem information with specimen and species information from other IABIN thematic networks.
   5. Maintain the ecosystem information Thematic Network


Key Issues:

The following issues represent the main challenges to IABIN in achieving the goal related to ecosystem information:

•     Lack of widely accepted standards for ecosystem classification inhibits comparison of information from one region to another.
•     Ecosystem information exists at multiple scales and resolutions
•     Inadequate geo-referencing of specimen and observation data to develop understanding of relationships between ecosystems and species distributions
•     Relatively little existing support for international collaboration on ecosystem data standards.
•     Few existing tools that support analysis and interpretation of ecosystem data for decision-making.