Papers by Prof Vishwas Chavan
Hanssen, F. (editor), Mathur, V.B. (editor), Athreya, V., Barve, V., Bhardwaj, R., Boumans, L., C... more Hanssen, F. (editor), Mathur, V.B. (editor), Athreya, V., Barve, V., Bhardwaj, R., Boumans, L., Cadman, M., Chavan, V., Ghosh, M., Lindgaard, A., Lofthus, Ø., Mehlum, Pandav, B., Punjabi, G. A., F., González Talaván, A., Talukdar, G., Valland, N. and Vang, R. Capacity building for Intergovernmental Platform for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Final report. Indo- Norwegian pilot project on capacity building in biodiversity informatics for enhanced decision making, improved nature conservation and sustainable development. - NINA Report 1079. 116 pp. Dette pilotprosjektet har vært koordinert av Norsk Institutt for Naturforskning (NINA) i nært samarbeid med Wildlife Insitutute of India (WII), Artsdatabanken, Naturhistorisk Museum ved Universitetet i Oslo, Wildlife Conservation Society- India Program (WCS) og Centre for Wildlife Studies (CWF) i India. Prosjektet er finansiert av den Norske Regjering med støtte fra den og India. Prosjektet har samarbeidet med Global Biodivers...
Audubon Core Maintenance Group. Audubon Core standard 2021-02-21 version
This release updated usage values for terms having controlled values (format, subtype, and varian... more This release updated usage values for terms having controlled values (format, subtype, and variant) to link to the lists of terms for those controlled vocabularies. It also includes a minor update to align borrowed Darwin Core terms with their current metadata.
Engaging new communities in Biodiversity Data Publishing
<p>This presentation was given at the CBD CoP 11 side events in Hyderbad, India during Octo... more <p>This presentation was given at the CBD CoP 11 side events in Hyderbad, India during October 2012</p
Background: Increasing the quantity and quality of data is a key goal of biodiversity informatics... more Background: Increasing the quantity and quality of data is a key goal of biodiversity informatics, leading to increased fitness for use in scientific research and beyond. This goal is impeded by a legacy of geographic locality descriptions associated with biodiversity records that are often heterogeneous and not in a map-ready format. The biodiversity informatics community has developed best practices and tools that provide the means to do retrospective georeferencing (e.g., the BioGeomancer toolkit), a process that converts heterogeneous descriptions into geographic coordinates and a measurement of spatial uncertainty. Even with these methods and tools, data publishers are faced with the immensely time-consuming task of vetting georeferenced localities. Furthermore, it is likely that overlap in georeferencing effort is occurring across data publishers. Solutions are needed that help publishers more effectively georeference their records, verify their quality, and eliminate the dupl...
© Norwegian Institute for Nature Research. The publication may be freely cited where the source i... more © Norwegian Institute for Nature Research. The publication may be freely cited where the source is acknowledged.
Towards Next Generation (data inclusive) Publishing
<p>This presentation was given at "DataCite Summer Meeting 2012" held in Copenhag... more <p>This presentation was given at "DataCite Summer Meeting 2012" held in Copenhagen, Denmark on 14 June 2012.</p
Biological Conservation, 2021
Highly populated tropical countries face tremendous pressures in reconciling the needs for improv... more Highly populated tropical countries face tremendous pressures in reconciling the needs for improved economic security and the protection of declining biodiversity. India is no exception and its biodiversity is under severe pressure due to complex interactions among land use change, other human economic activities, and climate change. Preservation and restoration of biodiversity is perhaps the cheapest and least risky way to mitigate the impacts of threats such as climate change, diminishing food and nutritional security, declining economy, absence of affordable healthcare, rising zoonotic diseases and lack of capacity to address these issues. Here we describe a framework for biodiversity conservationthe National Mission on Biodiversity and Human Well-Being (NMBHWB) for Indiawhich integrates biodiversity, ecosystem services, climate change, agriculture, health, bio-economy and capacity building in the realm of biodiversity science. We provide an overview of the seven Programs of the Mission which make it interdisciplinary, integrative, and comprehensive in its approach. The Mission explicitly links research with policy-making and implementation for effective management of biodiversity with sustainable development. With its emphasis on convergence and synergies among various goals, themes and project sites, the Mission will further develop new models for stakeholder consultations and coproduction of knowledge. We posit that the NMBHWB will enable India to realize the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and Targets while advancing India's commitments to the Paris Agreement on climate change and other international environmental conventions and treaties.
GBIF Best Practice Guide For ‘Data Discovery and Publishing Strategy and Action Plans’. Version 1.0
Biodiversity Informatics, 2010
The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) has a mandate to facilitate free and open acc... more The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) has a mandate to facilitate free and open access to primary biodiversity data worldwide. This special issue of Biodiversity Informatics publishes a collection of papers that summarize the findings of the recent GBIF Task Group on a Global Strategy and Action Plan for Mobilization of Natural History Collections Data (GSAP-NHC). The GSAP-NHC Task Group has made three primary recommendations dealing with discovery, capture, and publishing of natural history collections data. This overview provides insight on various activities initiated by GBIF to assist with an early uptake and implementation of these recommendations. It calls for proactive participation by all relevant players and stakeholder communities. Given recent technological progress and growing recognition and attention to biodiversity science worldwide, we believe that rapid progress in discovery, publishing and access to large volumes of useful collection data can be achieved for the immediate benefit of science and society.
Recommendations of the GBIF Multimedia Resources Task Group
Biodiversity Informatics, 2013
With the establishment of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) in 2001 as an inter... more With the establishment of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) in 2001 as an intergovernmental coordinating body, concerted efforts have been made during the past decade to establish a global research infrastructure to facilitate the publishing, discovery, and access to primary biodiversity data. The participants in GBIF have enabled the access to over 377 million records of such data as of August 2012. This is a remarkable achievement involving efforts at national, regional and global levels in multiple areas such as data digitization, standardization and exchange protocols. However concerns about the quality and 'fitness for use' of the data mobilized in particular for the scientific communities have grown over the years and must now be carefully considered in future developments. This paper is the first comprehensive assessment of the content mobilised so far through GBIF, as well as a reflexion on possible strategies to improve its 'fitness for use'. The methodology builds on complementary approaches adopted by the GBIF Secretariat and the University of Navarra for the development of comprehensive content assessment methodologies. The outcome of this collaborative research demonstrates the immense value of the GBIF mobilized data and its potential for the scientific communities. Recommendations are provided to the GBIF community to improve the quality of the data published as well as priorities for future data mobilization.
ZooKeys, 2011
The northeast region of India is one of the world's most significant biodiversity hotspots. One o... more The northeast region of India is one of the world's most significant biodiversity hotspots. One of the richest bird areas in India, it is an important route for migratory birds and home to many endemic bird species. This paper describes a literature-based dataset of species occurrences of birds of northeast India. The occurrence records documented in the dataset are distributed across eleven provinces of India, viz.:
Impact Assessment and Project Appraisal, 2012
Biodiversity information obtained during environmental impact assessments (EIAs) is rarely access... more Biodiversity information obtained during environmental impact assessments (EIAs) is rarely accessible for other uses following the completion of the EIA. Such data need to be made readily accessible; adding them to publicly accessible national datasets is important if biodiversity science, conservation and future decisions based on environmental assessment are to benefit from new biodiversity data and improved biodiversity data coverage. An 'EIA Biodiversity Data Publishing Framework', based on the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) global standards, is thus proposed to meet this need. This paper outlines the GBIF-catalysed initiative to establish such an operational framework for uptake by the EIA community, as well as options that are available for data publishing in the absence of such a framework. It reviews the current state of accessibility and management of the primary biodiversity data associated with EIA studies, and highlights the urgent need for uptake of a range of data-publishing tools and best practices for making EIA biodiversity data exchangeable using globally accepted standards. Lessons learnt from pilot projects in India and South Africa underline the call for the rapid uptake of a national-to-global scale EIA Biodiversity Data Publishing Framework.
CURRENT SCIENCE-BANGALORE-, 2003
Compilation of inventories of components of coastal and marine biodiversity of Indian Ocean is ha... more Compilation of inventories of components of coastal and marine biodiversity of Indian Ocean is hampered by several factors: low effort by some countries, preference to certain taxon, dwindling taxonomic expertise, low infrastructure of Information Technology, databases that are scattered and often non-interoperable, inconsistent reporting and a marked reluctance to share data and information. The creation of the Indian Ocean node of the Ocean Biogeographic Information System is meant to overcome some of these constraints. Benefiting from progress in Information Technology and building on the global efforts on understanding what lives in our seas, the IndOBIS aims to grow into a self-sustaining and collectively supported process of information collation, analysis and dissemination, serving the countries of the region and the international scientific community.
Hanssen, F., Mathur, V., Athreya, V., Bakkestuen, V., Chavan, V., Lindgaard, A., Mehlum, F., Gonz... more Hanssen, F., Mathur, V., Athreya, V., Bakkestuen, V., Chavan, V., Lindgaard, A., Mehlum, F., González-Talaván, A., Vang, R. & Valland, N. 2012. Capacity building for Intergovernmental Platform for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). Progress report 2011: Indo- Norwegian pilot project on capacity building in biodiversity informatics for enhanced decision making, improved nature conservation and sustainable development. - NINA Report 801. 24 pp. This report describes the activities and achievements in 2011 of the Indo- Norwegian pilot project on capacity building in biodiversity informatics for enhanced decision making, improved conservation and sustainable development in India. The pilot project is initiated and funded by the Norwegian Ministry for Foreign affairs, the Norwegian Environmental Ministry and the Norwegian Directorate for Nature Management. The pilot project is also highly welcomed and explicitly supported by the Government of India. Capacity building has been i...
This pilot project has been coordinated by The Norwegian Institute of Nature Research (NINA) in c... more This pilot project has been coordinated by The Norwegian Institute of Nature Research (NINA) in close collaboration with the Wildlife Institute of India (WII), the Norwegian Biodiversity Information Centre (NBIC), The Nature History Museum at the University of Oslo (NHM), the Wildlife Conservation Society- India Program (WCS) and the Centre for Wildlife Studies (CWF) in India. The Norwegian Government has funded the project with support from the Indian Government. The project has collaborated with the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) and has implemented several of the capacity building tools, standards and services offered by GBIF. In addition, WII and NHM host the national GBIF- nodes of India and Norway. Furthermore, the project is closely linked to the Indian and international strategies on biodiversity infrastructure development. The project has focused on national user needs, camera trapping techniques, data management, open access and barriers towards open acces...
Biodiversity Informatics, 2005
There is a disparity in availability of nomenclature change literature to the taxonomists of the ... more There is a disparity in availability of nomenclature change literature to the taxonomists of the developing world and availability of taxonomic papers published by developing world scientists to their counterparts in developed part of the globe. This has resulted in several discrepancies in the naming of organisms. Development of electronic catalogues of names of known organisms would help in pointing out these issues. We have attempted to highlight a few such discrepancies found while developing IndFauna, an electronic catalogue of known Indian fauna, and comparing it with existing global and regional databases.
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Papers by Prof Vishwas Chavan