Africa is one of the most megadiverse continents in the world.  Here biodiversity plays a critical role in sustainable development, provides vital ecosystem services and is one of our greatest regional assets.  The benefits of biodiversity are crucial to key economic sectors (i.e. forestry, agriculture, fisheries, tourism, health and energy) and to providing solutions to sustainable development and poverty alleviation on the continent. The management of our natural assets and the information related to this are crucial.  Ultimately, we cannot manage what we don’t measure.

In the last three decades significant progress has been made in the field of biodiversity informatics, and more recently in Africa.  Initiatives such as the GBIF-Africa network and the recent Africa Rising Conference (collectively > 25 countries engaged) have made significant strides in highlighting the priorities and opportunities for coordinated action in biodiversity information (BIM) on the continent, and for bridging the data-science-policy interface.  The Africa Rising Conference culminated with the release of a ‘Declaration on biodiversity information for sustainable development in Africa’, a joint statement of intent developed by participants during the conference.

The use of essential TDWG standards has enabled the mobilisation of millions of biodiversity data records, which is just the tip of the iceberg.  Increased participation and collaboration by biodiversity informaticians regionally, with the TDWG community at large, will grow human capital in this scarce skills area.  We want to ensure that we are drawing on the network of expertise to develop the best tools, to gather and analyse the correct data to support the best possible future.  The establishment of Centres of Excellence in BIM presents opportunities for collaboration, and cooperation in data mobilization, fitness-for-use, development of tools and applications to support informatics efforts and especially in the use and applications of data.  These are all key elements in the transformation of data towards information, knowledge and decision-making.

Knowledge is the basic form of capital for innovation (knowledge generation, accumulation, and exploitation).  Economic growth is driven by innovation, and the key driver for innovation is “high-end” human capital. Thus as a global network, we need to look closely at capacity development in this scarce skills area of biodiversity informatics, to ensure that ultimately we are able to account for our natural capital, in support of economic growth, poverty alleviation and sustainable development.