Introduction

The original GSPC Target 1 aimed to develop “a widely accessible working list of known plant species as a step towards a complete world flora” and this target has almost been achieved.

While efforts to complete the working list will continue, the focus beyond 2010  is to enhance the list and make it more useful, accessible and functional for end users by progressing to the second part of the 2010 target – ‘as a step towards a complete flora’.

This may include developing more complete synonymy, updating geographic distributions to country level by drawing on national floras, checklists and international initiatives; inclusion of basic identification tools (keys, pictures and basic descriptions) and inclusion of local and vernacular names where possible.

Download an introduction to Target 1 here.

Learn more

The first definitive list of plant species for the Global Strategy for Plants conservation was published at www.theplantlist.org in December 2010. The Plant List includes some 300,000 species of plants.

For comparison, a more ambitious project called The Catalogue of Life which aims to list all living things including plants, animals, fungi, microbes, etc recorded 1.3 million species in its 2011 annual checklist. Both the Catalogue of Life and The Plant List are incomplete; and there’s a debate as to whether either of them will ever be finished as new discoveries are constantly being made.

Creating a definitive list of plants seems a simple task. However, the same plant species may be given a different name by people in differing places and at differing times (or simultaneously!) The Plant List includes 300,000 species yet there are at least a further 480,000 names by which these plants are also known (synonyms)  i.e. often there are many plant names for one plant species.  For example, the tree which is commonly known as the Doum Palm or Gingerbread Tree, and whose scientific name is Hyphaene thebaica, is also known by 16 other scientific names. 

In calling for the creation of a complete world flora, this target goes beyond simply listing the names of all know species, but includes providing additional information about each species. Such information should include more complete synonymy, local and vernacular names, geographical distribution, links to descriptions and conservation status (linking to Target 2).

There are many examples of national and regional floras and these will form the basis for developing a complete world flora.

The implementation of this target relates to Target 19 of the Aichi targets of the Strategic Plan for Biodiversity 2011-2020:

T19: By 2020, knowledge, the science base and technologies relating to biodiversity, its values, functioning, status and trends and the consequences of its loss, are improved, widely shared and transferred, and applied.  

Implementation

At the national level, the first step in implementing this target is to develop a national plant checklist. Most countries do already have a national checklist and many have a national Flora. For areas where there is no plant checklist, regional checklists may provide a good starting point. Other sources of information include the Catalogue of Life, which can provide a list of all species recorded for a particular country. From this list, a checklist of plants can be extracted. Similarly the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) provides information on species recorded in each country.  

There are many examples of national and regional floras, and increasingly these are available on-line. A list of some on-line floras is available at http://www.efloras.org/index.aspx

At the global level, a range of tools and resources exist to support the implementation of this target. These include The Plant List, more than 250 years of published Floras, treatments and monographs and the APG3 classification system that can be used to define the family-level framework.

In April 2012, four leading botanic gardens: the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (RBG Kew), the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE), The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) and the Missouri Botanical Garden (MBG), announced plans to develop the World Flora—the first modern, online catalogue of the world’s plants—to be made available by the year 2020. Read more about this here and download an information paper about the World Flora on-line project here.

Tools and resources

Please also check in the database of Tools of Resources for Case Studies relevant to this target.

Status

The first definitive list of plant species for the Global Strategy for Plants conservation was published at www.theplantlist.org in December 2010. The Plant List includes some 300,000 species of plants.

A workshop entitled ‘The World Flora:  possibilities and perspectives’ was held during the meeting of the Global Partnership for Plant Conservation in Missouri, July 2011. The key outcomes and recommendation from this workshop were:

1. Major assets to complete a World Flora by 2020 include existing data and frameworks:
   • The Plant List can be used to define the list of species to include in the Flora
   • More than 250 years of published floras, treatments, and monographs
   • An APG3 classification system that can be used to define family-level framework

2. A major constraint for this Target is the 2020 deadline for delivery.  Attendees acknowledged that achieving 100% completeness may be impossible but believe that 80% completeness with 100% confidence in product could possibly be achieved.  They also agreed that the project must leverage existing floras and datasets and do new fieldwork and taxonomic research only where data gaps occur.

3. The World Flora should include a minimum set of required fields while maintaining high-quality, trustworthy data.  The content should be defined by a working group who will take under consideration the audience for the project.

4. Human capacity building is a key activity in delivering the World Flora, as the project has the potential to engage hundreds, if not thousands, of taxonomists, parataxonomists, students, and citizen scientists from all over the world.  It is important to consider the human resources needed to execute the project as well as the resources needed post-2020.

5. Building networks will be a key factor to achieve this target, and participating institutions should work in areas of the world where they have regional or monographic focus.

6. Tools for collaborative work should be developed, such as an interactive web site and APIs for data use.
   

In April 2012, four leading botanic gardens: the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (RBG Kew), the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh (RBGE), The New York Botanical Garden (NYBG) and the Missouri Botanical Garden (MBG), announced plans to develop the World Flora—the first modern, online catalogue of the world’s plants—to be made available by the year 2020. Read more about this here and download an information paper about the World Flora on-line project here.

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