News from the net

Global species information system announced.

The European Union recently announced that it would contribute to a global species information system announced the same day in Washington as a follow up to G8þ5 biodiversity talks in Potsdam, Germany in mid-2007. The EU contribution, SpeciesBase, will use European funds to collate data from across the continent for the new database. The European Commission has also launched“Net-Biome” a research project to aid biodiversity protection in the tropical overseas territories of EU countries such as France and the UK. Details on Net-Biome are available at: http://europa.eu/rapid/pressReleasesAction.do?reference=MEX/07/0510&format=HTML&aged=0&language=EN&guiLanguage=en(“Other news” item 3).