Orchids of Costa Rica,
Vol. 1 & Vol. 2

Páramos de Costa Rica

Costa Rica native Ornamental Plants
(Third edition)

Common Plants of the Hitoy Cerere Biological Reserve - Costa Rica

Historia Natural de Golfito

Isla del Coco Fishes
(Second edition)

For more information
Telephone:
(506) 507-8184

E-mail:
editorial@inbio.ac.cr

Book Store:
www.inbio.ac.cr/editoriall

December 4th
Christmas in INBioparque
(sale of Christmas articles)

December 18th
Costa Rican traditional
Christmas activities

For further information, please dial: (506) 507-8107
www.inbio.ac.cr/inbioparque

Biodiversity: Knowing about it and using it sustainably

Following seven years of intensive work, the National Biodiversity Institute (INBio) has completed two of the most long-lasting projects in its history. They were known as “Development of biodiversity resources” and “Development of the knowledge and sustainable use of biodiversity,” the latter followed by a second phase entitled “Toward a sustainable INBio.” Both were financed with support from the GEF/World Bank and the Government of the Netherlands.

With these two projects, INBio was able to further its work in various directions, one of which was to generate knowledge on Costa Rica's biological wealth, especially of species and ecosystems.

Activities for species identification boosted the Institute's collections by 30%. The amount of material identified to the species level tripled over the course of the project, and the number of identified species in the collection doubled.

The two projects yielded significant contributions, not only by building new knowledge of biodiversity, but also by developing much better physical facilities here and in other parts of the world. The projects provided extensive training and knowledge transfer. It was conducted by Costa Rican parataxonomists, technicians and curators in partnership with a broad network of national and international taxonomists, and results were entered into Internet data bases and described in more than 750 scientific articles and field guides.

Research also included environmental studies to advance scientific knowledge of selected species (plants, birds, vertebrates and invertebrates) to improve decision-making on conservation and sustainable use. By the time the work was ended, over 30 studies had been completed with the support of around 42 researchers.

An additional feature was the ECOMAPAS project, based on a Geographic Information System, that compiled an inventory encompassing 44% of Costa Rica's land ecosystems and 54% of its total ground cover.

The information developed by these projects, as well as knowledge and skills acquired by the staff, will stand as a firm foundation for the on-going work to conserve biodiversity and use it sustainably.

Jesús Ugalde
Director Ciencias de la Biodiversidad
INBio