LIMBE CONFERENCE RECOMMENDATIONS

WORKING GROUP ONE

BIODIVERSITY INVENTORYING AND MONITORING

Working Group One considered the question of how to link the inventorying and monitoring of biodiversity to forest management actions that aim to incorporate the conservation of biodiversity. It concluded that the effective conservation of biodiversity in tropical rain forests within Africa requires that a feedback loop of information and action be established between forest management and forest monitoring. To achieve this they felt required a number of actions.

Inventory and Monitoring Studies

To ensure the contribution to conservation of biodiversity inventorying and monitoring studies, the Working Group recommended that:

• When Monitoring biodiversity, ensure that studies have objectives that are clearly linked to conservation, are built into management plans, and are appropriate for the different levels operating - local, national, international.

• Monitoring should be cost-effective, robust, simple, and include involvement of local people, and all other stakeholders; it should make use of whatever ecological information is available, and identify 'signal-levels' for action with mechanisms for appropriate response.

• Studies should be statistically rigorous and, if employing Permanent Sample Plots (which are especially useful for plant monitoring) should do so carefully.

• Inventories of biodiversity should have clear objectives, and should seek to identify priority species and habitats, with "importance scores" reflecting local, national and international status.

• Taxonomic capacity within Africa should be strengthened - since taxonomic expertise underpins all biodiversity survey work. Taxonomists working within Africa should make their findings readily available, and accessible - especially through the timely production of field guides and keys.

Biological Research

• Biological research should be carried out as a necessary underpinning of conservation work; this will enable an understanding of the mechanisms and causes of change so as to assist with predicting the effects of different forest management actions.

• Biological research should be linked closely with socio-economic information.

Information exchange and communication

Working Group One, in acknowledging that improved information exchange and communication between scientists and forest managers is crucial to establishing the management-monitoring feedback loop, recommended:

1. That Joint Management Committees, that include scientists, be established for important conservation sites

2. That scientists endeavour to improve links within the scientific community

3. That the 'Clearing House Mechanism' of the Convention on Biological Diversity is promoted and adequately financed

4. That national 'Centres for Biodiversity Study' are identified and strengthened

5. That regional exchanges are facilitated between biodiversity specialists, e.g. by regional meetings

6. That informal information and publication exchanges between projects and institutions in Africa are established

7. That harmonization of methodologies, and compilation of casebooks to assist in designing surveys and monitoring schemes, are pursued

8. That biodiversity databases build user-needs into their design, be accessible to those users, and produce information that is digestible to decision-makers

9. That researchers working in Africa collaborate with local institutions in the design and implementation of projects, and in the sharing of results, and especially in the training of students and technical staff.

Training

Training needs within Africa for biodiversity conservation are numerous and diverse; the Working Group highlighted some specific recommendations:

1. Post-graduate level courses in biodiversity conservation at African universities need enhancing and strengthening, with an emphasis on monitoring and management

2. Short field courses in survey and monitoring methodology and applications are required at the undergraduate and post-graduate levels, these would be especially valuable if regional in scope

3. National-level courses in survey and monitoring techniques are needed for technical staff and para-taxonomits / para-ecologists

4. All training in biodiversity techniques and methodologies should ideally be linked with the development of appropriate career structures for African biologists.

Funding

Biodiversity studies, especially monitoring schemes, require long-term funding, the Working Group therefore recommended that:

1. Scientists and managers work together to develop priorities for funding, and secure support from donors and from government to meet national needs

2. Funding of information provision, and for strengthening national biological initiatives, should be given high priority, as this underpins much research and conservation work.

3. Funds need to be available as contingency reserves to meet sudden emergencies in biodiversity conservation.