The rich and diverse African flora has been studied by successive generations of colonial and in-country taxonomists. The base of these studies taxonomic studies has been the establishment of collections of preserved herbarium specimens, which today represent the backbone of several centuries of scientific endeavour. These herbaria are vast stores of information and knowledge on plant diversity of individual countries, floristic regions and the continents as a whole. However, taxonomy is a dynamic branch of biology and the African floristic inventory continually expands as new information is added through ongoing fieldwork and other investigations. Despite the advances made by molecular systematics in testing hypotheses of phylogenetic relationships, the collections of herbarium specimens and their alpha-taxonomic study remain a cornerstone of modern biology.

Access to the types (that is physical specimens) that fix the names of plants is imperative if plants are to be correctly named and knowledge about species is to be collated and communicated. However, information on the existence, location and condition of such specimens is often lacking, representing a serious impediment to the study of African plant diversity. This difficulty is especially acute in Africa , where resources and facilities for taxonomic research are limited. In addition, the type specimens of African plants are mostly held by herbaria situated in the “north”. For this reason the API Project aims to:

aggregate data on African plants from various regions of the world, the content being important to both the countries of origin and the world-wide scholarly community, and to build and support an online database of these resources.

This will be achieved through collaboratively:

• negotiating agreed Memoranda of Understanding that indicate conditions under which the images and associated information will be made accessible;
• establishing a decentralised system of nodes in northern and southern botanical institutions and herbaria where type specimens of African plants can be imaged and information on them databased;
• resourcing such nodes and other herbaria with the appropriate hard- and software, training and capacity to ensure the completion of the project;
• dissemination of digitised images;
• developing on-line portals and nodes through which images can be easily and affordably accessed.

The Project is managed by a Steering Committee consisting of representatives from the Mellon Foundation, the Royal Botanic Gardens , Kew , and the South African National Biodiversity Institute (SANBI). The day-to-day management of the Project is delegated to designated Project-Co-ordinators at the various nodes who implement decisions taken by the Steering Committee.

The API Project within SANBI consists of three teams based at the National Herbarium, Pretoria , the Compton Herbarium Cape Town, and at the KwaZulu-Natal Herbarium in Durban. The Project members are:

• Prof. G.F. Smith – (Chief Director Biosystematics Research and Biodiversity Collections, SANBI). Project Leader ( Pretoria )
• Dr. J.P. Roux – (Curator, Compton Herbarium). Project Manager, SANBI (Cape Town )

For further information please contact Dr. J.P. Roux at roux@sanbi.org

The project has now largely been completed. In the process SANBI has submitted 20725 images of type specimens held in its collections, as well as 9628 visuals. Visuals include scans of photographic and art collections.