India Biodiversity PortalWestern Ghats Portal

http://indiabiodiversity.org

http://thewesternghats.in

October 2011

Outline of Slide Deck

Biodiversity Portals in India Background of India Biodiversity Portal

(IBP) and Western Ghats Portal (WGP) Under the hood: Technology and Structure Citizen Participation

Biodiversity Portals in India

Biodiversity Portals in India We believe there is a lot of information on the

Biodiversity in India that is dissipated among many people.

We believe strategic investment in collating, aggregating, and publishing already available information on Indian biodiversity will provide huge dividends.

Over the last few years there have been many initiatives to address this.

Species Pages InitiativesURL Focus Content People

Butterflies of Indiahttp://ifoundbutterflies.org/January 2010

ButterflySpecies Pages

576 species; 178 lifecycles; 3 keys; 8500 Images

Krishnamegh Kunte Ecologist

Indian Bio-resource Information Network (IBIN) http://sec.org.in/programs/indianbioresourceshttp://www.bisindia.org/2001

PlantsSpecies Pages Spatial data

Flora digitized; Large content;Distribution data in grids;Distributed Nodes.

KN Ganeshiah , UAS, Bangalore

Project Brahma http://www.projectbrahma.org/Summer 2010

All SpeciesSpecies Data

670 species PhD Students

Flowers of India http://www.flowersofindia.inMay 2005

Flowering PlantsSpecies DataIdentification Keys

Many species Dinesh Valkeindiatreepix

Species Pages InitiativesURL Focus Content People

French Institute of Pondicherry http://www.ifpindia.org/biodiversityportal/index.php?lang=en2008

Western Ghats Tree SpeciesHerbarium dataIdentification KeysEco DatabasesVegetation maps

500 species6 vegetation maps

BR RameshIFP

Flora of Nilgiri. http://opendata.keystone-foundation.org2008

Species Page 271 species T BalaKeystone Foundation

efloraindia website https://sites.google.com/site/efloraofindia/June 2007

Plants Species Photos

Many PM Gargindiatreepix

Traditional medicine http://envis.frlht.org/~2006

Medicinal PlantSpecies Pages

6198 species;Herbarium;Atlas;Species Names

Darshan Shankar, FRLTHIBP Partner

Species Pages InitiativesURL Focus Content People

AVIS-IBIS http://avis.indianbiodiversity.org/December 2010

Species pages for birdsExpanding to other taxa

~1000 bird species

Arpit Deomurari, FESIBP partner

India Biodiversity PortalWestern Ghats Portalhttp://indiabiodiversity.orghttp://thewesternghats.inDecember 2008

Species PagesChecklistsSpecies DistributionBiodiversity Conservation

611 species 150 maps112127 occurrence records

ATREE, IFP, Consortium of partners

Madhya Pradesh Forest http://mpforest.org/~2006

Governance and monitoring

Maps Government initiativesData source for protected areas

Anil Oberoi, Forest Officer

Citizen Science InitiativesURL Focus Content People

MigrantWatch http://www.migrantwatch.in/July 2007

Citizen ScienceBird migration

30 species1400 participants

Suhel Quader, NCBS

SeasonsWatch http://www.seasonwatch.in/Jan 2011

Citizen Science. Tree Phenology and seasons.

100 trees800 participantsExpanding

Suhel Quader, NCBS

Jackals: Past and Present http://conservation.in/jackal/index.phpJune 2011

Distribution of Golden Jackals 60 day survey

470 observations

MD Madhusudan NCF

Conservation Threats http://conservationthreats.org/December 2009

Conflict and threats in conservation

100 records of conflictLocation details on a map

Hari Krishnan. Personally supported

India Nature Watch http://www.indianaturewatch.net/

Mailing ListsURL Focus Content People

indiatreepix https://groups.google.com/group/indiantreepix/about?hl=enJune2007

Tree photograph identification

Photos and species note1728 members6000 message1200 p/month

PM Garg

diversityindia: http://www.facebook.com/groups/DiversityIndia/Feb 2011

Picture sharing and identification

Pictures Vijay Barve

NATHISTORY-INDIA listserv@princeton.edu 

Any topic on natural history of India

Diverse and miscellaneous notes1118 members75 p/month

Princeton University

Background of India Biodiversity Portal and Western Ghats Portal

IBP Phase I:Mar 2008 - Dec 2008 Endorsed by the National Knowledge

Commission, Govt. of India Placed in civil society Focused on map-based biodiversity information Species referencing system was a hard problem

with many big players.

IBP Phase I: Mar 2008 - Dec 2008

Three teams: Development, Curation and Design At launch, 100 map layers Funding: ~ USD 100K as contributions from

Jamshedji Tata Trust, JRS Foundation, private donor, in-kind contribution

Managed by consortium of Partners http://indiabiodiversity.org

Phase II: WGPNov 2010 – June 2013 http://thewesternghats.in Multi-site Drupal system with IBP Feature set for phase II

Species PagesParticipation Interface Identification tools and application

Funding: ~450K USD from CEPF; $150K for development and $300K for campaign and content.

CEPF Projects in the Western Ghats Biodiversity Hotspot

One of the most densely populated biodiversity hotspots

CEPF ~$4.5-million over five year investment.

20 Large Grants > $20,000 and 27 Small Grants < $20,000

Large grant to build a open access, public participatory information portal.

Project Execution plan

Data Assimilation and Curation: Led by French Institute of Pondicherry (IFP) * IFP has over 5 decades of work in the Western Ghats * Additional sub-grants to curate data CEPF projects data

Campaign for Participation led by IFP and Strand * Field campaigns for voluntary participation of data among all stakeholders of the Western Ghats

Platform Development led by Strand Life Sciences

Project Duration (32 months): Nov 2010 to June 2013

Project Details Phase-IJune2011

Phase-IIJune2012

Phase-IIIJune2013

Review of state-of-the art of web-GIS and conservation portals.

Deploy all CEPF projects with distributed upload and mechanisms for authentication and review.

Enhanced Web GIS platform with intuitive interfaces for search and serve.

Deploy species pages and identification tools conforming to global standards.

Deploy application tools for data visualization via a charting and plotting module.

Deploy collaborative module for easy participation and upload of data in collaboration with user groups.

Expose Application Programming Interfaces and collaboration with global biodiversity portals.

Campaign to build an Open Source community and active participation for long-term sustainability

The perpetual beta application

The portal with basic features launched in June 2011

Development by the Agile method The site will be in perpetual beta constantly under

development The application will be enriched with periodic

updates of features The site will be enriched with regular updates of

curated and contributed data

Content Strategy

India centric and India focused Data management by French Institute Data from CEPF grantees and WGP partners Partner with IBIN as IBIN node, sharing and

exchanging species information Aggregate species information from other India

based sites Support data curation by EoL Rubenstein Fellow

Content Strategy

Set up community based validation mechanisms Campaign among young researchers (YETI) to

participate and contribute Provide APIs to share information with other

sites. Crowd source for distribution information Inclusive and participatory governance

Implementation Partners

Team

BR Ramesh, IFP

Sravanthi, Strand

Rahul Yadav, Strand

Chitra Ravi, ATREE

Sabah Rubina, ATREE

Prabhakar, Strand

G Muthusankar, IFP Ayyappan, IFP

Arunabha Ghosh, Strand

Devayani Khare, IFP

D Balasubramanian, IFP

Under the hood

Design Principles

Conform to global standards for map data and species data

Use publicaly available services GNI name service GeoNames server IUCN conservation status APIs …

Integrate maps and species pages Expose APIs for data exchange Contribute to global databases

Species Application

Data Model

Species Page Schema

Citizen Participation

Citizen participation plans

Build icon library for species representation, identification and navigation

Expand biodiversity information, conservation status, and occurrence records for species through citizen participation

Enhance collaboration and participation for data generation and validation

Icons for Species

Icons to navigate species pagesWhich other species are insect pollinated?Which other species have fleshy fruit?Which species fruit during March – April?Which other species share the same habitat?

Identify species with iconsSelect icons for species characteristicsNarrow-down searches

Baccaurea courtalensis

Arenga wightii

Actinodaphne malabarica

Scleropyrum pentandrum

Cinnamomum malabatrum

Other colors

Habit Leaf Flower Fruit SpecialSpecies

Type MarginShape Type Color Type Armed

white

Hairy

Actinodaphne malabarica

Cinnamomum malabatrum

Scleropyrum pentandrum

Arenga wightii

hasHabit

hasHabit

hasHabit

hasHabithasFruitType

hasFruitType

hasFruitType

hasFlowerType

hasFlowerType

Habit (Trees, Shrubs, Climbers, Herbs, Palms etc.,)

LeafType (Simple, Compound)

LeafMargin (Entire, Lobed etc.,)

LeafShape (Peltate, tri/palmi nerved etc.,)

FlowerType (Cauliflorus, axillary/terminal etc.,)

FlowerColor (white, green, etc.,)

FruitType (Pod, Drupe, Berry, Capsule etc., )

ArmedNature (thorns etc.,)

http://rs.tdwg.org/ontology/voc/SPMInfoItems#Morphology

hasIdentificationCharacteristics

XML of Species Information

Mangifera indica

<spm:hasInformation>

<spmt:Morphology rdf:ID=“Morphology">

<spm:context xml:lang="en">Western Ghats, India</spm:context>

<spm:hasContent xml:lang="en">

Mangifera indica is a large erect evergreen tree,  … Leaves alternate, simple, leathery, oblong-lanceolate, 16-30

x 3-7 cm, on flowering branches,  … There is great variation in the form, size, color and quality of the fruits. These drupes may be nearly round, oval, ovoid-oblong, or somewhat kidney-shaped

</spm:hasContent>

</spmt:Morphology>

</spm:hasInformation>

XML of Species with ICMangifera indica

<spm:hasInformation>

<spmt:Morphology rdf:ID=“Morphology">

<spm:context xml:lang="en">Western Ghats, India</spm:context>

<spm:hasContent xml:lang="en">

Mangifera indica is a large erect evergreen tree,  … Leaves alternate, simple, leathery, oblong-lanceolate,

16- 30 x 3-7 cm, on flowering branches,  … There is great variation in the form, size, color and quality of the fruits. These drupes may be nearly round, oval, ovoid-oblong,

or somewhat kidney-shaped

</spm:hasContent>

<st:hasHabit>Tree</st:hasHabit>

<st:hasLeafType>Simple</st:hasLeafType>

<st:hasFruitType>Drupe</st:hasHabit>

</spmt:Morphology>

</spm:hasInformation>

Icon Resource Table

Taxonomy Rank

Taxon Concept

SPMInfoItem

IC Concept

IC Description

IC Value IC Icon

Root All (0) Size Min Length

… NA

Root All (0) Size Max Length

… NA

Root All (0) Size Avg Length

… NA

… … … … … … …

Root All (0) Uses Medicine …

Root All (0) Uses Cooking …

… … … … … … …

Kingdom Plantae (0.0) Morphology Habit … (Tree / Shrubs / Climbers …)

Kingdom Plantae (0.0) Morphology Leaf Margin

… (Entire / Lobed …)

Kingdom Animalia (0.1) Morphology Skeleton Type

… (External / Internal)

Phylum Arthropod (0.1.0)

Morphology Skeleton Type

… External

Class Insecta (0.1.0.0)

Morphology Wings …

* IC = Identification Characteristic

Expand Species Occurrence records

Harvest occurrence records from checklists and map layers

Use map module for crowd sourcing species distribution

Use applications on mobile devices to report species occurrences with spatial coordinates

Populate occurrence table with Location, Species, Source, and Accuracy

Participation for Data Generation and Validation Critical mass required for data generation and

validation Explore text mining of mailing lists to extract

information (indiatreepix) Design for three roles for each unit (Species

Page and Map Layers): Member, Validator, Administrator

Maintain revision history How to maintain history on map layers??

Roles for Participation

Role Privileges

Unit Member Add data to the unitModify added dataDelete added data

Unit Validator Add data to the unitValidate data of membersDelete data members

Unit Administrator Add / delete any dataAssign roles

Thank you

October 2011