Report - Estonia

1
Report - Estonia

• Mati Martin
• University of Tartu

2
Current state of affairs and level of
organisation of our focal point

• Museum of Natural History
• University of Tartu
• Estonia

3
Home institutional support

• Relational database initiatives
• Database server services

4
What are the future perspectives could you for
instance use your EDIT involvement to obtain
financial (or otherwise) support?

• Yes
• Local financial support would be much easier if
  our museum is participating in the EDIT or other
  EU projects
• Cofinancing is important

5
What is your relationship with other
international (DIVERSITAS, CHM, EPBRS, etc.) and
local biodiversity programs?

• We have no relationschip with any international
  programs beside the Fauna Europaea project

6
Country support to GBIF and relationship with
local GBIF-node?

• Estonia is the GBIF Participant!
• Local GBIF-node is Environmental Ministry
• Country support to GBIF is very small
• Contacts with local GBIF-node is very limited
• Primary data electronically not accessable

7

• Local projects
• Estonian Environment Infocentre Nature Bureau
• http//eelis.ic.envir.ee/w4/
• The list of duties
• collecting, analyzing and providing environmental
  data
• compiling and issuing of environmental reviews
• participating in state environmental monitoring
  programme
• transforming environmental data into
  geo-referenced data (GIS) and processing of
  spatial data
• maintaining of environmental information systems
• contributing to elaboration of environmental
  legislation
• providing consultations, expertise and
  assessments in its field of activity
• acting as a national focal point (NFP) for
  European Environment Agency and UNEP/Infoterra
  network
• acting in the consortia of EEAs ETC/NPB and
  ETC/WMF
• exchanging with and reporting of environmental
  data to EEA, EUROSTAT, European Commission, UNEP
  and other international institutions

8
Does your country have a national species
checklist program and (if so) are you involved
within this effort?

• Estonian Species Register
• Database is based on a MySQL platform running on
  a Red Hat Linux Apache httpd server
• Database of taxon names based on Taxonomer model
  (Pyle, 2003, Bioinformatics)
• http//unite.ut.ee/temp/natmus_in.php
• This is heart of our museum database
• Database includes also information on
• Specimen
• Locality
• Reference
• Multimedia
• DNA bank
• Red Data Book

9
What is (was/will) be the role of the European
major checklists on establishing a national
species list?

• Very important role
• Major checklists have basic information for
  establish national lists
• Scientific names
• Synonyms
• Distribution
• Biology

10
Do you maintain an overview of local expertise
resources? How do you assembling details on
local expertise and could this information be
used as input for other European expert(ise)
information services?

• Yes it is partly solved inside our museum
  database. (Module agents taxon names)
• local expertise resources.
• Lepidoptera - Geometridae
• Hymenoptera Apoidea, Chrysididae
• Diptera Mycetophilidae
• Fungi
• Lichens

11
Do you maintain an information system and (if so)
what kind of system?

• Common specimen based database for the all
  Estononian research collections
• http//unite.ut.ee/EestiLiigid/index.php
• UNITE - fungal barcoding project is also hosted
  by our server and database. It demonstartes what
  type of homepages can be compiled from the
  database
• http//unite.ut.ee
• Estonian lichenological herbarium
• http//www.ut.ee/lichens/

12

• Virtual herbarium
• http//www.cybernature.ee/herb/
• List of Estonian vascular plants
• http//www.zbi.ee/tomkukk/nimestik/
• Distribution of Estonian plants
• http//www.zbi.ee/levikukaardid
• List of Estonian birds
• http//www.eoy.ee/varamu/lists/estbird.htm

13
Did (or will) you review your local species
list(s) by crosschecking it/them with the
European checklists or vice verse?

• Yes, it is very important
• Plus other major taxonomic databases in order to
  check names

14
Did (or will) you involve local specialists in
reviewing the European checklists and what (in
general) is/was the involvement of local
societies and taxonomic working groups within the
validation process?

• Yes
• Reviewing Index Fungorum - taxonomic database
• Fauna Europaea project
• Group coordinator
• Dr. Tarmo Timm Limnic Oligochaeta
• Associate specialist
• Dr. Eino Krall Phytonematoda
• Taxonomic specialist
• Dr. Jaan Viidalepp Lepidoptera Geometridae
• Unfofficial taxonomic specialist for Baltics and
  Belorussia
• Dr. Olavi Kurina Mycetophilidae

15
Would you like to have (technical) support to
validate your local checklists?

• Taxonomical support will be needed
• Technical support probably not

16
How does your country deal with taxonomic
standards for EU rules on environmental issues
(ICES, CBD), EU-directives, conservation biology
(IUCN), pest organisms (EPPO), and so on? Does
your country agree on certain taxonomic standards
for EU regulations?

• In all activities in Estonia we consider
  taxonomic standards of EU regulations
• Does your country agree on certain taxonomic
  standards? In general yes

17
Which additional formal steps (in your view) need
to be taken to approve on European taxonomic
standards?

• ?
• Agrrements on states level?

18
Does your country have standard (red) lists on
endangered species?

• Internet version of this list http//www.zbi.ee/pu
  nane/
• Estonian Red databook was created three times on
  1979, 1988 and 1998
• The first list was for official use only and
  contains 249 endangered species
• The second list was compiled in 1988 and contains
  data about 315 endangered species
• The third issue was created on the basis of main
  IUCN but adjusted for loucal conditions
  published in 1998 contains 1318 species
• In 2007 new Red Data Book under preparation
  according to full IUCN criteria

19
Did (or will) you implement the existing EU
taxonomic standards (the European authoritative
checklists) within your local biodiversity
services?

• Yes

20
Did (or will) you cross-reference your species
details to the European checklists species
details?

• Yes

21
Do your local biodiversity service allow
cross-referencing from the European checklists
giving access to additional local biodiversity
details?

• Still not
• http//eelis.ic.envir.ee/w4/
• This is the point of negotiations and cooperation
  

22
Which additional info and data types could you
provide (common names, detailed faunistics,
conservation status, species images,
identification keys, etc.)?

• Database includes information on
• Specimen
• Locality
• Reference
• DNA
• Conservation
• Keys
• Multimedia (Images, videoclips, sounds of animals
  etc)
• etc modules

23
To what extent is your country involved within
the ongoing e-taxonomy work process?

• Local e-taxonomy is very high level only for few
  taxa (Fungi, some insects groups and parasitic
  Echinococcus worms)
• It means we have expertise in Estonia

24
Thank you!