Welcome / Karibu

Providing a centralized, reliable, and openly accessible repository of more than 2 million verified plant specimen records from across 11 East African countries (Participants), improving data quality, standardization, and interoperability among research institutions and conservation agencies.

By enabling real time data sharing, analysis, and visualization, it will strengthen regional and cross-border collaboration and accelerate botanical research and biodiversity assessments. The portal will support evidence-based conservation planning, and climate adaptation through authoritative species distribution and ecological data, while integrating with global biodiversity infrastructures, promoting standardized workflows, ensuring long-term data preservation and building institutional capacity through digital tools and training.

The portal also allows the generation of maps, checklists and other interactive projects. The information entered in this portal can be published to the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), from where it can be harvested by other regional and international aggregators. The data within the portal are freely available for use, but proper citation is encouraged.

Our project uses the open source software Symbiota, which is designed to distribute natural history information from multiple sources, including images, descriptive text, checklists, interactive keys and museum specimen data. To learn more about the features and capabilities available through this site, visit the Symbiota Documentation