The South African National Vegetation Database: History, development, applications, problems and future

Michael C. Rutherford; Ladislav Mucina; Leslie W. Powrie

doi:10.4102/sajs.v108i1/2.629

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The South African National Vegetation Database: History, development, applications, problems and future

Journal article

Open access

Peer reviewed

The South African National Vegetation Database: History, development, applications, problems and future

Michael C. Rutherford, Ladislav Mucina and Leslie W. Powrie

South African Journal of Science, Vol.108(1-2)

2012

DOI: https://doi.org/10.4102/sajs.v108i1/2.629

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Abstract

conservation targets

data combinations

ecoinformatics

locality confidence

species bias

Turboveg

Southern Africa has been recognised as one of the most interesting and important areas of the world from an ecological and evolutionary point of view. The establishment and development of the National Vegetation Database (NVD) of South Africa enabled South Africa to contribute to environmental planning and conservation management in this floristically unique region. In this paper, we aim to provide an update on the development of the NVD since it was last described, near its inception, more than a decade ago. The NVD was developed using the Turboveg software environment, and currently comprises 46 697 vegetation plots (relevés) sharing 11 690 plant taxa and containing 968 943 species occurrence records. The NVD was primarily founded to serve vegetation classification and mapping goals but soon became recognised as an important tool in conservation assessment and target setting. The NVD has directly helped produce the National Vegetation Map, National Forest Type Classification, South African National Biodiversity Assessment and Forest Type Conservation Assessment. With further development of the NVD and more consistent handling of the legacy data (old data sets), the current limitations regarding certain types of application of the data should be significantly reduced. However, the use of the current NVD in multidisciplinary research has certainly not been fully explored. With the availability of new pools of well-trained vegetation surveyors, the NVD will continue to be purpose driven and serve the needs of biological survey in pursuit of sustainable use of the vegetation and flora resources of the southern African subcontinent.

Details

Title: The South African National Vegetation Database: History, development, applications, problems and future
Authors/Creators: Michael C. Rutherford - S African Natl Biodivers Inst, Appl Biodivers Res Div, Claremont, South Africa
Ladislav Mucina - Curtin University
Leslie W. Powrie - S African Natl Biodivers Inst, Appl Biodivers Res Div, Claremont, South Africa
Publication Details: South African Journal of Science, Vol.108(1-2)
Publisher: Academy of Science of South Africa
Number of pages: 8
Grant note: University of Pretoria University of Stellenbosch National Department of Water Affairs and Tourism SANBI University of the Free State University of the North
Identifiers: 991005579953207891
Murdoch Affiliation: Centre for Terrestrial Ecosystem Science and Sustainability
Language: English
Resource Type: Journal article

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Collaboration types: Domestic collaboration; International collaboration
Citation topics: 3 Agriculture, Environment & Ecology; 3.40 Forestry; 3.40.86 Plant Communities
Web Of Science research areas: Ecology
ESI research areas: Plant & Animal Science