The Somali Institute for Environmental Peace (SIEP) officially launched the “Building Capacity for Biodiversity Data Mobilization and Conservation in Somalia” project in Mogadishu. More than 40 representatives from federal and state institutions, universities, environmental organizations, research bodies, and biodiversity experts attended the event. The meeting was opened by the CEO of SIEP, Mr Khalif Dalmar, and the Director General of the Ministry of Environment and Climate of the Federal Government of Somalia, Mr Abdirisak Ahmed Ali. The objective of the meeting was to formally launch the project and communicate its goals, data holders mapping, identification and creating dialogue for data sharing agreements for national benefits.
Project focus: strengthening national capacity to mobilize, standardize, manage and publish biodiversity data through GBIF, supporting conservation, research, education and policymaking. The project is funded by the European Union through the GBIF Biodiversity Information for Development (BID) programme.
Key discussions and outcomes
- Shared understanding: Participants reviewed the project’s objectives, implementation roadmap and intended national benefits.
- Data-holder engagement: The meeting opened dialogue on mapping biodiversity data holders, identifying available datasets and establishing data-sharing arrangements.
- GBIF publication process: Participants discussed data cleaning, standardization and publication using GBIF standards and open-data principles.
- Coordination and commitments: A coordination mechanism was established for follow-up activities, and data holders committed to make available relevant biodiversity data for assessment, cleaning and publication.
Next steps
The project meeting has created a coordination mechanism for future events and data mobilization, and discussed how to collect biodiversity data and the process of publishing through GBIF standards. The meeting created a common understanding of its implementation roadmap, and participants acknowledged the project goals. One of the agreed action points and data holder committed to share all available biodiversity data that every institution or individual has for cleaning and publication. SIEP will continue engaging participating institutions and individual data holders, consolidate the preliminary data inventory, and support the preparation of priority datasets for publication through GBIF. Follow-up activities will also strengthen coordination and build the technical capacity required for sustainable biodiversity data management in Somalia.
