Otte and Naskrecki This project will summarize the southern African biodiversity of an economically and ecologically important group of insects, the Orthoptera (grasshoppers, crickets, mantids and relatives), and provide an online means to identify the species. All major biodiversity research depends on an underlying sound taxonomy, on the capacity reliably to identify the members of communities. Most of the important collections needed for biodiversity research in Africa reside in European museums. This project will provide online digital photographs of the important museum voucher material not otherwise accessible to biologists. It will, therefore, create a virtual museum for use by African biologists. This will be achieved by creating new web pages, called the Southern African Orthoptera (SAO) website. The project, in collaboration with South Africans and Namibians, will therefore consist of four parts: digital imaging of existing museum specimens, especially those relevant to species identification; digital imaging of already published material which is needed for reliable identification; collecting in ecological regions known to be rich in species (three biodiversity hotspots) or to be of special biogeographic or ecological interest; and developing a website to host tools for the identification of species and the description of new species. Recent ecological and biodiversity research shows that orthopteroids (their species diversity and abundances) are excellent indicators of land use and restoration, and useful in landscape planning, in providing insight into stocking levels of domestic livestock, in reserve selection, in assessing the value of conservancies, and as tools for rapid assessment of biodiversity. South Africa also includes within its boundaries 3 of the 33 world biodiversity hotspots, and all three are severely impaired. Knowledge on African Orthoptera has been frozen in recent years as a result of a loss of taxonomic experts. Most conservation institutions in southern Africa are entirely dependent on researchers from academic institutions for providing information on the fauna. The project is an ideal solution, because South African biologists have become quite dependent on transmission of expert knowledge through the internet. The project will also provide a solid foundation for further work by South African scientists. The major southern African biodiversity collections strive to form appropriate partnerships with individuals, institutions, or organizations to achieve particular objectives. There will be considerable interaction among museums in this project. The SAO website will be dynamically linked to the biodiversity databases of the South African National Collection of Insects (a component of the Agricultural Research Council and the Plant Protection Research Unit), the South African National Parks, the Namibian Biodiversity Database, the biodiversity database run by the Department of Economic Affairs, Environment and Tourism of the Eastern Cape, and the Namibian Ministry of Youth, National Service, Sport and Culture. Local students will be involved in all aspects of the proposed research. They will help in collecting new material and in the preparation of museum specimens. A very important objective of the project is to build a model for training students in biodiversity research. To this end an educational component will be established with the University of Stellenbosch.
