International forestry inventory network (BIOTREE) for the conservation of Central American biodiversity

Regino Jesús Zamora Rodríguez, Luis Cayuela Delgado, Francisco Javier Bonet, Lucía Gálvez Bravo, José María Rey Benayas, Duncan John Golicher, Adrian Newton, Kalle Roukolainen, Mario González Espinosa, Neptalí Ramírez Marcial, Rakan Ammar (Zak) Zahawi, Cristina Garibaldi Escobar.

The initiative, it is hoped, will improve the availability of data on Central American trees, by this means stimulating information exchange and collaboration between Central American and European scientists, while helping maximize the use and utility of data collected by researchers the world over, thereby economizing on material and human resources. The first step is to compile the information contained in over 1400 inventories distributed throughout Mexico, Belize, Honduras, El Salvador, Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama. The project will not stop at integrating information on species distribution, but will also include details of their biological and ecological attributes. This is of prime importance for species conservation and the restoration of habitats, and will also contribute to our fundamental knowledge of the ecology of many species.