Workshop "The Red List of insect taxonomists - Assessment of taxonomic expertise in Europe"

Workshop time: 9:30 - 16:00 CET

The European Red List of insect taxonomists is a European Commission project  implemented by Pensoft, CETAF and IUCN. The overall aim is to assess the extent of taxonomic expertise on insects at the Pan-European and EU level, including national level assessments for some taxa of particular importance as pollinators.

The project is a response to the Commission's recognition of the risk of disappearance of taxonomic expertise, which would hinder the effective implementation of  the EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030,  including actions to reverse the decline of (pollinating) insects. Without taxonomists, it will not be possible to document the populations and trends of species, and thus to assess their conservation status. A comprehensive dataset on taxonomic expertise was  compiled and curated, during the first 10 months of the project, via different channels including querying the CETAF community, taxonomic organisations, research infrastructures, literature and via a purpose built taxonomic experts self declaration portal.

You can read more about the initiative on the EU Pollinator Information Hive website.

What we hope to achieve at this workshop is to collect feedback and further insights on how to better promote and support taxonomic expertise across Europe. Ultimately, we intend to contribute to the European Green Deal and the Biodiversity Strategy 2030.

Aims of workshop 

The aims of this workshop are as follows: 

• Comprehensively address major topics related to understanding the implications of the results for the European Commission and the taxonomic community.
• Propose recommendations for future actions to avoid risks of further erosion of insect taxonomic expertise.
• Identify potential channels and processes for long-term sustainability and expansion of the Red List of Taxonomists assessments, including data acquisition and accuracy, securing funding, as well as engaging additional stakeholders and national authorities. 

Our workshop - hosted by the Red List of Taxonomists team: CETAF, IUCN and Pensoft - is to see invited participants coming from a wide breadth of taxonomic-related backgrounds, as well as the political, and societal interfaces.