While going through some unread parts of eFI I found this discussion
interesting. Attaching two published documents- one by me and the
other by BSI to clarify their stand in this regard.
On Friday, September 25, 2009 11:19:41 AM UTC+5:30, JM Garg wrote:
Hi, Dr. Rawat ji & Dr. Madhav ji,
There has been lot of discussion on your report & also before this.
I am summarising only important aspects/ views for your kind
perusal pl. so these are properly taken care of in your final report.
Burning issue remains the creation of *e-flora of India & use of
advance modern tools like 'Indiantreepix' e-group* /for achieving
different goals, from the *Approach* suggested in your draft./
_1. From R. Vijayasankar, Systematic Botanist, National Herbarium
of Medicinal Plants, Foundation for Revitalisation of Local Health
Traditions (FRLHT)
[Centre of Excellence for Medicinal Plants & Traditional
Knowledge], Bangalore-560 064, Mobile: 9448970441_
Respected Prof. Madhav Gadgil Ji & Dr. G.S. Rawat,
I wish to congratulate the Task Force team for preparing
comprehensive recommendations for revitalization of BSI/ZSI.
Thanks for circulating the draft report for public’s opinion.
The recommendations are clear and complete. However, I (in fact
thousands of botanists/ plant lovers) wish the following tasks to
be given more emphasis as high priority tasks to be executed by
BSI, with collaboration wherever possible:
1. An UPDATED ‘Checklist of Flowering Plants of India’ with
ADEQUATE details should be published ONLINE without further delay.
2. Floras should also be published electronically (‘e-Flora of
India’) and that should be comprehensive in nature and freely
accessible to all. For this a dedicated task force, as also
suggested by your team, should be set up with expert members from
various institutions across the country, under the
co-ordination/direction of BSI. To start with state/ regional
e-Floras to be prepared/supported by BSI. These collectively can
contribute for preparation of e-Flora of India.
3. A NATIONAL LEVEL electronic ‘Virtual Herbarium’ should be
developed and REGULARLY updated. All Type specimens, in addition
to others, of all Indian plants should be digitized and made
accessible to the public.
4. Publication of the reputed ‘Bulletin of Botanical Survey of
India’ should be regular and made ONLINE WITH FULL ACCESS. [Only
electronic version of papers/articles to be accepted and hard
prints (often several hard copies required by different journals)
should NOT be accepted, as an effort towards conservation of trees
and the environment (will other journals consider this too?)].
5. There are many Ph.D. theses/ reports on district floras and
revisionary works remain unpublished. These should be carefully
updated and published.
6. Lastly, but importantly, the threat status of native plant
species that are facing serious threat of extinction (1000-1500
spp.?) should be QUICKLY assessed in order to identify the
PRIORITY species that require IMMEDIATE conservation action.
_2. Rajesh Sachdev, Moderator, Indiantreepix _
I fully support Vijayshankarji, specially on first two points
which are much critical and have larger importance as well.
3. _From Dr. E S SANTHOSH KUMAR, Tropical Botanic Garden and
Research Institute, Palode, Thiruvananthapuram-695562, Kerala, India_
Kindly add my suggestion to the draft copy under the heading
*Capacity building: district level scientific community and
barefoot taxonomists
*
Establishment of a few Systematic Gardens associated with major
research institutes/botanic gardens will be beneficial to the
students of botany and these will cater their need as a ‘living
text book’ for systematic study. Students/amateur botanist can be
trained in these gardens.
Many thanks
4. _From J.M.Garg, Co-ordinator 'Indiantreepix' e-group_
"Flora and Fauna of India
The primary mandate of the BSI/ZSI is to document the plant/
animal resources of the country. Hence an important focus of their
activity would be to complete the Flora/ Fauna of India. India has
produced a large number of fine taxonomists, many of whom work
outside BSI/ZSI, e.g., universities, research organizations and as
emeritus scientists. Therefore, it is important that BSI/ZSI now
take on the role of coordinating and pooling the expertise of all
the taxonomists including those working outside this organization
to consolidate the Flora and Fauna of India volumes. This is
particularly important because the local field biologists and
experts who have spent a considerable amount of time in a
particular geographical area can add tremendous information on
habitat, associations, biogeography and population status. Floras/
Faunas written by the individuals having limited field knowledge,
merely based on the museum/ herbarium specimens lack in such
information. Coordinated work on Flora/ Fauna of India should also
include all the works on various taxonomic groups done through
AICOPTAX Project of MoEF. Such coordination would of course
require a strong editorial board and a few full time dedicated
executive secretaries. This should be achievable in 10 years and
should figure out as Priority I in BSI/ZSI’s Vision 2020
document. This could be achieved in the following phases:
i. Establish a panel of experienced and active taxonomists
for each state and take their consent on participation in Flora /
Fauna Project,
ii. Prepare an annotated checklist of vascular plants and
other taxa under consideration for each state / UTs based on all
published documents and herbaria, giving local names, if any,
locality and habitat,
iii. Circulate the electronic version of checklists among the
panel of botanists/ zoologists who would, in turn, check for
omissions, ambiguities, localities and habitat through active
consultation with other local botanists/ zoologists,
iv. To begin with, state floras/ faunas should be published
electronically giving correct names, basionyms, localities,
habitat, sketches and photographs of important species preferably
on an interactive ‘Flora/ Fauna of India Blog’. On this page all
naturalists, photographers and biological artists should be
encouraged to contribute information on taxonomy, distribution,
natural history, biology, ethnobiology, etc. This will also act
as an outreach programme for all the biologists. The
ethnobiological surveys should be done mainly by the local
biologists, college and university teachers, working with local
Biodiversity Management Committees under technical guidance by
BSI/ZSI.
v. An editorial board may be constituted at the national
level to decide the format of the flora/ fauna and also assign
plant/ animal families for compilation which should include
nomenclature, description, ecology, natural history, distribution,
sketches and photographs."
I am not clear what it means by ‘Flora/ Fauna of India Blog’ &
seek Madhav ji's guidance in the matter particularly w.r.t the
word Blog. Also it is not clear whether it will be accessible to
all or not. I think any restriction on its access as far as its
contents are concerned, should go away in view of the 'Approach'
followed in the paper (as subsequently highlighted). While it is
encouraging to see " To begin with, state floras/ faunas should be
published electronically giving correct names, basionyms,
localities, habitat, sketches and photographs of important species
preferably on an interactive ‘Flora/ Fauna of India Blog’. " in
the draft, there is hardly anything which talks of creating
e-flora of India on the lines of e-flora of China & other
neighbouring countries. I feel 'AICOPTAX Project' of MoEF should
be sufficiently strengthened with a mandate for simultaneously
creating of e-Flora/ e-Fauna of India on lines of e-Floras of
different countries of the world. How to go about creating
e-floras is evident at link:
http://flora.huh.harvard.edu/china/PDF/misc/eFloras_Taxon_55_188-192_2006.pdf
<http://flora.huh.harvard.edu/china/PDF/misc/eFloras_Taxon_55_188-192_2006.pdf>
This becomes all the more important as the report in its
'Approach' rightly talks of "......Finally, the culmination of
evolution of artifacts to the present day Information and
Communication Technology has brought us to the threshold of a
tenth major transition: x] Language based human societies –to-
Human societies with global access to the entire stock of human
knowledge, and engaged in an endeavour of collaborative knowledge
generation." This approach will remain an illusion until & unless
we are able to create e-Flora/ e-Fauna of India which is
accessible to all human community & appear in top 10 while
searching as far as 'Indian species' are concerned. The need of
the hour is to move fast in this regard, if India is to be visible
on the world map. It is said that we have to refer to 'e-Flora of
China', 'e-Flora of Pakistan' etc. when we search on net for
information about any Indian plant species.We hardly find any inf.
on search in our "......national networks like DBT’s India
Biodiversity Information Network (IBIN) and NBA’s India
Biodiversity Information System (IBIS)." as talked about in the
report.
Further if the dreams of its 'Approach' "......Finally, the
culmination of evolution of artifacts to the present day
Information and Communication Technology has brought us to the
threshold of a tenth major transition: x] Language based human
societies –to- Human societies with global access to the entire
stock of human knowledge, and engaged in an endeavour of
collaborative knowledge generation." are to be fulfilled in this
e-age, it has to speak loudly about increasing participation &
expertise in on-line community activities like those of
'Indiantreepix' google e-group, regarding which it is totally
silent. Here information is shared on real time basis for the
benefit of all stakeholders, minimising delays & fastening
processes, following multi-disciplinary approach with membership
from diverse background. This should also help in the process of
constant learning in ones' career & creating passionate
scientists/ taxonomists aided/ guided by other willing scientists/
taxonomists. This should also help in *"Capacity building:
scientists"* & *"Capacity building: district level scientific
community and barefoot taxonomists under "7)Human Resources"*
_5. From Dr. Gurcharan Singh, Associate Professor, Department of
Botany, SGTB Khalsa College
University of Delhi, Delhi-110007:_
I strongly feel that the vast information lying in hard covers of
BSI/ZSI journals, publications, Fascicles of Flora of India, Flora
of India volumes, has to come out on the internet so that we may
not fend for information and identification, the Efloras of
Pakistan, China, North America, etc. There is need for compilation
of this information, and I feel there are numerous experts even
outside BSI and ZSI who can collaborate. Our Eflora could be much
more meaningful with links to authentic identified photographs of
plants from India. We have huge databases of photographs on
Indiantreepix, Flowers of India and several similar privately
managed sites, which can be requested to collaborate and share
their data.
For ongoing research on Indian plants it is imperative have
have our herbarium specimens (at least representative ones) and
type specimens are scanned/photographed and uploaded as virtual
herbarium in lines of Fairchild virtual herbarium, Kew virtual
herbarium, Australian Virtual herbarium and Virtual herbarium of
New York Botanical Garden.
We have to open up if Indian research has to progress
_6. From Sh. Prashant Awale, Moderator 'Indiantreepix':_
I agree with the Dr Singh ji's view. Also, their has to be some
mechanism to get in touch with experts from BSI so that we can
share our experiences on flora of a particular region with them
and it might turned out to be totally new finding. Many of us are
frequently visiting various remote locations and information
gathered on flora from these areas might turned out to be of some
use to BSI. Some mechanism where by individuals / group can
interact with BSI should be available.
Already database like those of "Flowers of India" ,
"IndianTreePix" has come long way (Thanks to initiave by Mr Tabish
Ji, Mr Garg Ji) as more and more enthusiastics from various field
(Botanists, Nature lovers, Trekkers etc..) has contributed in some
way or other.
_7. Dr. Aparna Watve:_
Dear All,
Considering all the serious discussions going on so far on various
identities, use of family names, I am so happy to realize how
thisgroup is slowly maturing. People are discussing technical
terms, use of correct family names, below species ranks and
nomenclature- things which only the trained plant taxonomists
bothered with. Owing to this I feel the need to talk about more
use of standard floras and monographs which i had talked of in the
past. Relying only on handbooks, which are generally region
specific and can have only a limited number of species and
descriptions as compared to our vast diversity of flora, is good
for beginners. But at this stage, the serious ones on this group -
and there are many- should devote time to library and referencing
work- not from a single book (as it is not possible) but from
various standard references and then form their
opinion on identity of a species. In many cases the taxonomic
literature is also influenced by varied opinions of the
taxonomists and it is actually fun to read how some plant species
have baffled generations of plantwatchers.
_8. Dr. Gurcharan Singh:_
Aparna ji,
You have initiated a very valuable topic for the sake of our group
and the National Flora. While there is need for nomenclatural and
identity uniformity at India level and regional level,
unfortunately very little has recently been done at national
level, some very good regional publications have come up for us to
bank upon, discuss and arrive at a meaningful conclusion. Science
today is dynamic process, and it does not take a minute for new
information to reach www, for all of us to benefit from. It needs
a lot of time for a national compilation to come up.
But then there is a catch. There is also lot of wrong
information flying around on the internet, but with so many able
minded and sincere people around, we can (and have been) sieve the
right information.
_9. Janaki Turaga, member 'Indiantreepix'_
Dear Aparna,
For a majority of people: it is the question of access. From where
does one have access to all these monographs, of which many of us
are not even aware of?
Unless someone lists all the monographs and other related works
and puts them up for access on the internet which is accessible to
all the people in the group.
In absence of accessible knowledge, the key source of information
are the fieldguides which are accessible in the lay public domain.
And some internet sites which are maintained by people who are
deeply interested in the areas.
Interest groups like this group rely mainly on fieldguides, some
good internet sites and very importantly-peers who have built
their interest to a very high level and some professionals/subject
specialists who sustain the group. I have learnt a lot from the
peers in all the groups that I am a member of.
We all would like to take things ahead, but we should have the
awareness of and access to these resource.
The issue is that of access and knowledge of the monographs etc.
If some of the subject specialists in this group who do have
access to these resources, can make them available to the rest of
the group, then I feel a majority of people will benefit.
Janaki Turaga
_10. Dr. Rakesh Biswas:_
/Quoting Rashida:
serious reference work one should do in a library. I feel no
amount of links and material available on the internet can really
at this stage, substitute the research work one needs to carry out
from acknowledged authors, volumes of flora of a state or region,
wealth of India volumes, and related articals in magazines and
scientifc journals./
I wonder if the problem could be simply solved by transferring all
the libraries into a web space as most web based user driven
learning activists are engaged in doing?
Quoting from the first chapter in this book (which also contains a
subsequent chapter contributed by members of Indiantreepix):
http://www.igi-global.com/requests/details.asp?ID=657
<http://www.igi-global.com/requests/details.asp?ID=657>
Traditionally libraries have been considered as temples of
learning and an important requirement for a library user is
‘silence’ which in effect means that the individual user needs to
imbibe whatever learning available on his/her own from books or
whatever other media available.
However in such an isolated learning environment, the single
individual
has no access to a second opinion from another person, no access
to a complementary perspective, or external critique, neither does
the single individual have any chance to get complementary
literature from anyone which might have a different reference
library. Given this, there is not much social interaction in this
kind of traditional learning environment. (Wiberg 2007)
However in modern libraries it is able to break past this
‘silence’ barrier where the library user predominantly browses an
electronic information network rather than a paper based
disconnected media.
Unfortunately, this advantage of the modern library is under
utilized as even systems for online universities, or distance
education may not have adequate support or encouragement for
social interaction. Most of these systems assume a centralized
communication model in which the learning peers (i.e. the
students) mostly communicate with one central peer (i.e. a mentor
or advisor). This leads in many cases to communication related to
the structure rather than the content of an online education and
does not support spontaneous, creative social learning processes.
(Wiberg 2007)
What it is to be knowledgeable can be defined either in terms of
how much one person has read and learned in isolation, or how
knowledgeable a particular person is about different threads to
grasp in order to gain access to other peers in different social
networks. The latter concept pinpoints the social dimension of
learning processes, the social interaction setting, and goes back
to a Socratic understanding of knowledge gaining through
conversations and argumentations with others.
Learning schools are redirecting the focus from what has been
labeled “traditional computer-based learning environments” towards
user-driven learning networks supported by social internet based
applications. The assumption that computer-mediated learning will
occur in the classroom, managed by a teacher, is now being
challenged, not by schools and educational software developers,
but by the consumer growth of personal technologies. (Sharples 2002)
_11. Dr. Gurcharan Singh:_
The main topic of discussion here is whether the huge wealth of
research information lying in libraries of major Universities,
BSI/ZSI is available to the average plant lover are not. Agreed
serious researchers need libraries to work, but we are talking of
taking knowledge to the general public and what is the best means
of making information available to them. I have several volumes of
Flora of Pakistan, a few of Flora of India, but please search
through your libraries and let me know how many have all volumes
of Flora of India published by BSI, how many have volumes Pakistan
Flora, and more importantly Flora of China, which has so many
plants common with our flora. Contrary to this I can sitting in
Delhi, California or anywhere else have access to Efloras, and can
identify my plants.
We are aiming to take information to the common man, and www is
the best medium for that.
But as I wrote earlier, there is some misinformation on the
internet, but there are then also meanins of sieving it. This
group has proved that many a times.
There are many important researchers active in BSI/ZSI and
different Universities. But the important question is have we all
benefitted from that?. WWW is there to pupularise that. Today if I
have to find any new research and development in Taxonomy I browse
APWeb and always find something new.
--
With regards,
J.M.Garg (jmga...@gmail.com <mailto:jmga...@gmail.com>)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jmgarg1
<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User:Jmgarg1>
'Creating awareness of Indian Flora & Fauna'
Image Resource of thousands of my images of Birds, Butterflies,
Flora etc. (arranged alphabetically & place-wise):
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:J.M.Garg
<http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:J.M.Garg>
For learning about Indian Flora, visit/ join Google e-group-
Indiantreepix:http://groups.google.co.in/group/indiantreepix?hl=en
<http://groups.google.co.in/group/indiantreepix?hl=en>
