Building: Main Building 1st Floor
Room: Salone degli Oceani
Last modified: 2013-09-24
Abstract
The Korea National Arboretum (www.kna.go.kr) started the Plant Species Database Development Project in 1998 to provide for stable conservation and systematic maintenance of national biological resources. Since then, various databases, including information on identification, specimens of plants, insects, fungi, and wildlife, have been compiled. The Korea National Biospecies Information System (www.nature.go.kr) developed through the above efforts is being maintained as the information center of national biological conservation and status.
The system is divided in two sections: a public service to fulfill social demands for diverse biological information, and a data collection system (intranet) for policy establishment and research purposes. In addition, through the Korea DATA Portal Service (www.data.go.kr) and Global Biodiversity Information Facility portal web site (www.gbif.org) data can be shared between Korean departments and with other nations. This allows response to international initiatives for gathering and sharing biodiversity and biogenetic information utilizing developed network systems. The Korea National Biospecies Information System is moving forward step-by-step with the active cooperation of many academic herbaria, insectaria, natural history museums, arboretums and botanical gardens, which are the sources of the biological information. As of August 2013, the Korean National Biospecies Information System contained 21 databases with 4.37 million records, including species profiles, specimen records, and living collections data for plants, insects, fungi, birds, and mammals.
Activities for database quality control include both scientific content and database structural integrity. Quality control of database content is the responsibility of experts on each taxonomic group, which secure data accuracy by collaborating with pertinent academic societies for inspecting and supervising scientific content. For quality control of the database structural integrity, a yearly quality diagnosis is carried out by authorized external database analysis experts. The results of these exercises are incorporated back into the database in order to improve its content and performance.