BIODIVERSITY INFORMATION BASE
The Commonwealth has committed $3.7 million for the Australian Biological
Resources Study in 1999-2000. The Study aims to underpin conservation and ecologically
sustainable management initiatives funded under the Natural Heritage Trust, in particular,
by implementing the National Strategy for the Conservation of Australia's Biological
Diversity requirements for increased knowledge about Australia's biota. The Government
will provide an additional $4.5 million over four years, commencing in 1999-2000, to
the ABRS to ensure that its Participatory Programme Grant Scheme component for taxonomic
research is maintained at an appropriate level.
The four key objects of the Study are:
- through its Participatory Programme, develop new knowledge about Australia's
biodiversity, and help maintain and further develop taxonomic capacity in Commonwealth,
State and Territory agencies and universities. Sixty-seven research projects were approved
for 1999 totalling $1.5 million;
- support professional training in taxonomy to counter a nation-wide decline in
recruitment to the field. For 1999, three postgraduate scholarships were awarded at
$18,600 each, while 12 postdoctoral fellows and an additional 14 postgraduate students
were supported under the Participatory Programme research projects;
- disseminate consolidated information on Australia's biota, including the publication of
catalogues and books, as well as, through the Internet and on CD-ROM. In 1998-99, nine
books were published and the ABRS Web site was upgraded. The Census of Australian
Vertebrate Species was updated. A number of Web and CD-based products were prepared for
release during 1999-2000; and
- promote taxonomic research, fieldwork, and the dissemination of biodiversity information
held in Australia's distributed biological collections, and in the wider global community,
through coordination, facilitation and development of partnerships with government
agencies, research organisations and professional societies and councils. ABRS continued
to be involved in developing the Global Taxonomy Initiative under the Convention on
Biological Diversity, and published the report from the second international meeting. Two
volumes of the international project Species Plantarum: Flora of the World were
published.
Contact: Environment Australia, Biodiversity Group -- 02 6250 9430
Research is essential to deal with the often unique nature of Australia's resources and
to support the Commonwealth's biodiversity conservation programmes. The CSIRO's
allocations on biodiversity research in 1999-2000 include:
- $4.6 million to improve and disseminate knowledge of biodiversity;
- $1 million to understand the functional role of biodiversity in ecosystems;
- $600,000 to develop new ways of using Australia's biodiversity;
- $400,000 to develop sustainable tourism;
- $5.7 million to conserve and monitor biodiversity;
- $2.2 million to integrate biodiversity conservation with natural resource
management; and
- $4.6 million to manage environmental pests, weeds and diseases.
In addition, the CSIRO is spending $3.3 million over 1998-99 and 1999-2000 on new
work to improve its use of bioinformatics, allowing better access to, and analysis and
visualisation of, genomic and biodiversity information. In the same period, it will spend
$1.9 million on novel technologies for feral animal control, focusing in particular
on control of European carp in the first instance.
Contact: CSIRO -- 02 6276 6124
