Indonesian Marine Taxonomist Crisis

We have always prided ourselves as a maritime nation with the greatest wealth of marine life. But our concern is minimal. Imagine, Indonesia, which has the second longest coastline in the world after Canada, has only 100-300 people marine taxonomist.

That, too, is combined with para-taxonomist, the taxonomist who did not fully do the job of taxonomy and identification of species of marine life. While the number of pure marine taxonomist less than half of the numbers above.

"In Indonesia, a senior taxonomist living and retired, while the lack of regeneration," said Secretary of the Census of Marine Life (CoML) Indonesia Tonny Wagey, on Thursday (January 26).

According to Tony, the activities of taxonomy and species identification of marine life has been a field that did not attract much attention. As a result, researchers who pursue the field of taxonomy is very little.

Training focused on coral taxonomy, coral reef monitoring, management and action planning skills, as well as project design, implementation and analysis skills, from EDGE regional training courses on the island of Hoga in Indonesia, July 2011. (Picture from:http://www.edgeofexistence.org/)

Putting the coral finder guide into action! The guide is also a great way for the course participants to pass their newly found coral ID skills and knowledge onto their colleagues. from EDGE regional training courses on the island of Hoga in Indonesia, July 2011. (Picture from:http://www.edgeofexistence.org/)

Senior researcher at Research Center for Oceanography LIPI, Professor Suharsono, said the phylogeny and genetic mapping taxonomy of marine life has become very urgent needs. Therefore, a shortage of marine taxonomist must be addressed immediately.

According to him, the need to add marine taxonomist can be measured by several things. For example, a taxonomist must handle at least one class in marine taxa, every order is handled within taxa ideally a taxonomist, and, for example, the minimum number of marine taxonomist is 45 people for all of Indonesia.

Tonny did not know exactly how many additional marine taxonomist required. Therefore, to determine the ideal number of marine taxonomist would first have to know how many species of marine life in Indonesia today. "We need about 100 more taxonomist who really new," he said.

CoML, national coordination meeting to agree on a few priority action plan.

1. First, make a list of researchers (para-taxonomist and taxonomist) marine who was in Indonesia.
2. Second, create a site and build a network of scientists. Includes set of protocols and standardization of methodologies, training of marine taxonomy, and fundraising through funding mechanisms.
3. Third, develop standards and operating procedures for the collection and use of data, compiled a database that contains information and research results census of marine life in waters of Indonesia that covers aspects of diversity, distribution, and abundance.*** [MAHARDIKA SATRIA HADI | KORAN TEMPO 3779]