In the project, the attribution of roles and responsibilities will be driven more by the motivation and availability of the candidates than by their gender. Nevertheless, based on the target persons already identified, the 50 % ratio should be respected.
Other "marginalized members of the community", the youth will be a privileged target throughout the project. Young post-secondary students will be included in the field training in order to develop their capacities as future researchers. again those already identified are females.
Many of the educational materials produced will continue to be used in the future by both PCA and the Museum. Also hopefully all of these activities have contributed to the creation of enthusiasm in our future generation of local botanists.
Emphasis on Sustainable Livelihoods
element of project will cover the need to co-exist with the plant kingdom and its important uses in medicinal culture - all with sustainability as the key.
Significant Participation of Indigenous Peoples
n/a
Policy Impact
n/a
Notable Community Participation
the development of a participative herbarium is at the centre of community participation: youth and school leavers will be engaged in photogrphy for the herbarium, the elderly for their knowldge of rarer plant species; regional exhibitions to general public, etc
Promoting Public Awareness of Global Environment
the project aims to do this as it raises awareness of general public to the knowledge of the high value of Faura species that surrounds us in the Seychelles. and so link that to the need to preserve these for world inhabitants, a similar concept to the coco-de-mer endemic to the islands.
Capacity - Building Component
this is the major element of the project. Museum staff and at least 6 young researchers in scientific and field methodologies, data collection and analysis relating to botany and herbarium management and development, including its relationship to conservation and vegetation restoration. The training will be led by PCA, in the National Herbarium, with excursions in the Morne Seychellois National Park.
Project Results
- Training of young Seychellois
•Seventeen persons, from 5 distinct institutions, participated in the initial training. The training included 7 and 31 days in the field for the initial and the intensive training, respectively.
•2 local researchers trained to detailed field knowledge on taxonomy and habitat: Nicole Labiche-Barreau, Nathachia Pierre.
-Production of Newsletters
PCA has produced one issue of their newsletter ‘Kapisen’ that is totally devoted to the SGP funded herbarium project (issue 13). In issues 14 and 15, there are a number of significant articles on SGP funded project. In Issue 15 PCA includes an article from another SGP Grantee, the Val D’an Dorre Farmers Association which is undertaking a project on Conservation of rare local Food Crops for diversity in the region of Val D’endorre . showing PCA making use of its expertise to assist other SGP grantees build their capacity and publicise their project.
It is to be noted that PCA’s newsletter Kapisen, is published for the consumption of local scientists and a general readership in the Seychelles at www.pcaseychelles.org/kapisen.html as well as internationally on the website of The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (after a long standing partnership of over 20 years) and can be accessed at http://www.plantecology.ethz.ch/publications/books/kapisen ”.
Upgrade of the Seychelles National Herbarium
• All collections present at Seychelles National Herbarium (ca. 4630 specimens) have been transferred and regrouped in the Museum in town, specimens were decontaminated, verified for their dimensions and adjusted if necessary to fit international standards (which correspond exactly to the depth of the herbarium cabinets). Nevertheless, non-vascular plants, fungi and algae still need to be inventoried and digitised.
• Most specimens’ data are digitised, plus other types of species records: 21068 entries.
• 1450 pictures have been compiled from internet searches, e.g. on taxonomic databases, and include many reference specimens for species names listed in the Seychelles.
• 2700 pictures have been taken in the field (including selected photos from the competition).
• ca. 400 pdf documents (tirés à part) have been compiled in a taxonomic library.
• 109 books have been compiled in the physical library of the herbarium, including a major donation from the Jardin Botanique National de Belgique, and newly ordered books.
• 1 MS Access database has been designed and adapted to Seychelles and has resulted in the National Herbarium becoming a key partner for a GEF study on the Seychelles Key Biodiversity Areas (KBAs). The herbarium project has contributed 40 % of the existing knowledge on geographical distribution of species of special concern (see KBA report).
• 2354 scientific names have been entered in the taxonomic database (corresponding to 1700 taxa), together with 1782 local names and 2283 species metadata.
• 12 permanent vegetation plots were set up on Mahé (in the Morne Seychellois National Park: master thesis of Elzein, 2011).
• ThumbsPlus, i.e. the software used for the virtual herbarium, was purchased and a project created which is directly linked with the herbarium database. Exchanges between the two complementary databases provide a very powerful tool for picture management using an updatable species nomenclature.
• The virtual herbarium holds 8093 illustrations of species, of which 6540 are species reported in Seychelles and the remaining illustrations are used for clarifying taxonomic status of some difficult Seychelles taxa. Among the ca. 1700 species constituting the flora of Seychelles, 1066 are illustrated in the virtual herbarium (but ca. 300 species are illustrated only with copyright photos). (www.seychellesplantgallery.com)
• Active collaborations have been developed with PCA (ongoing collaboration for taxonomic revision and database management), Université Libre de Bruxelles (2 master thesis by Belgian students), Jardin Botanique National de Belgique (herbarium material and literature received in donation, ongoing support for study of fungi), Museum National d’Histoires Naturelles de Paris (1 publication in preparation, plus ongoing perspectives to work on the fern flora).
All the points above represent a massive increase in results compared to the previous reporting period, and generally exceed by far the expected results from the original project document.
The national herbarium has received a considerable boost to its reputation amongst local scientists and the wider community. This project has set it on the right path by enabling training of staff and significant improvement to functional capacity. The herbarium database, if maintained and sustained, will bring long term and high quality management of data of great importance for conservation of Seychelles biodiversity. The virtual plant gallery will also provide a support to species identification for the local scientific community.
