University of Glasgow

Roderic Page

![A1BHupvR](https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/--WbhOcTkz2Q/VzGi8e7adKI/AAAAAAAAEMo/WkF4DmqVZhA/A1BHupvR.jpg?imgmax=1600 "A1BHupvR.jpg"){border="0"
width="128" height="128" style="float:right;"}Kew has released a new
report today, entitled the State of the World\'s Plants, complete with
it\'s own web site <https://stateoftheworldsplants.com>. Its aim:

> \...by bringing the available information together into one document,
> we hope to raise the profile of plants among the global community and
> to highlight not only what we do know about threats, status and uses,
> but also what we don't. This will help us to decide where more
> research effort and policy focus is required to preserve and enhance
> the essential role of plants in underpinning all aspects of human
> wellbeing.

This is, of course, a laudable goal, and a lot of work has gone into
this report, and yet there are some things about the report that I find
very frustrating.

1.  **PDF but no ePub** It\'s nice to have an interactive web site as
    well as a glossy PDF, but why restrict yourself to a PDF? Why not an
    ePub so people can view it and rescale fonts for their device, etc.
    Why not provide the original text in a form people can translate?
    The report states that much of the newly discovered plant
    biodiversity is found in Brazil and China, why not make it easier to
    support automatic translation into Portuguese and Chinese?
2.  **Why no DOI for the report?** If this is such an important
    document, why doesn\'t it have a DOI so it can be easily cited?
3.  **Why no DOIs for cited literature?** The report cites 219
    references, very few of them are accompanied by a DOI, yet most of
    the references have them. Why not include the DOI so readers can
    click on that and go straight to the literature. Surely you want to
    encourage readers to engage with the subject by reading more? The
    whole point of having digital documents online is that they can link
    to other documents.
4.  **No open access taxonomy** Sadly the examples of exciting new plant
    species discovered are all in closed access publications, including
    [The *Gilbertiodendron* species complex (Leguminosae:
    Caesalpinioideae), Central Africa
    DOI:10.1007/s12225-015-9579-4](http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s12225-015-9579-4)
    published in Kew\'s own journal *Kew Bulletin*. This article costs
    \$39.95 / €34.95 / £29.95 to read. Why do taxonomists continue to
    publish their research, often about taxa in the developing world,
    behind paywalls?
5.  **Why is the data not open?** Much of the section on \"Describing
    the world's plants\" uses data from Kew\'s database
    [IPNI](http://ipni.org). This database is not open, so how does the
    reader verify the numbers in the report? Or, more importantly, how
    does the reader explore the data further and ask questions not asked
    in the report?

These may seem like small issues given the subject of the report (the
perilous state of much of the planet\'s biodiversity), but if we are to
take seriously the goal of \"help\[ing\] us to decide where more
research effort and policy focus is required to preserve and enhance the
essential role of plants in underpinning all aspects of human
wellbeing\" then I suggest that open access to knowledge about plant
diversity is a key part of that goal.

Over a decade ago Tom Moritz wrote of the need for a \"biodiversity
commons\":
[DOI:10.1045/june2002-moritz](http::/dx.doi.org/10.1045/june2002-moritz)

> Provision of free, universal access to biodiversity information is a
> practical imperative for the international conservation community ---
> this goal should be accomplished by promotion of the **Public Domain**
> and by development of a **sustainable Biodiversity Information
> Commons** adapting emergent legal and technical mechanisms to provide
> a free, secure and persistent environment for access to and use of
> biodiversity information and data. - \"Building the Biodiversity
> Commons\"
> [DOI:10.1045/june2002-moritz](http::/dx.doi.org/10.1045/june2002-moritz)

The report itself alludes to the importance of \"opening up of global
datasets with long-time series (such as maps of forest loss)\", and yet
botany has been slow to do this for much of its data (see [Why are
botanists locking away their data in JSTOR Plant
Science?](http://iphylo.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/why-are-botanists-locking-away-their.html)).
We need data on plant taxonomy, systematics, traits, sequences, and
distribution to be open and freely available to all, not closed behind
paywalls or limited access APIs. Indeed, Donat Agosti has equated
copyright to biopiracy ([Biodiversity data are out of local
taxonomists\' reach
DOI:10.1038/439392a](http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/439392a).

It would be nice to think that Kew, as well as leading the way in
summarising the state of the world\'s plants, would also be leading the
way in making that knowledge about those plants open to all.


Kew has released a new report today, entitled the State of the World's Plants, complete with it's own web site https://stateoftheworldsplants.com. Its aim:  This is, of course, a laudable goal, and a lot of work has gone into this report, and yet there are some things about the report that I find very frustrating.
<b>
 PDF but no ePub
</b>
It's nice to have an interactive web site as well as a glossy PDF, but why restrict yourself to a PDF?

Rogue Scholar Beiträge

State of open knowledge about the World's Plants