Research Protocol Workshop - Thematic Review Papers
PALMS Thematic Review Papers for publication in Botanical Review
The PALMS projects work plan (Annex 1 – Description of Work) stipulates a deliverable consisting of six thematic research papers reviewing he fields in which our project carries out research. You remember that we have an agreement with Dennis Stevenson, editor of Botanical Review, that we can publish these papers back to back in that journal.
The original plan was that these papers would have been submitted by now, but obviously we are running late. However, please remember to include a status of these papers in your progress report for the work packages WP1 (Balslev), WP2 (Pintaud), WP3 (Macia), WP4 (Weigend), WP5 (Galeano) and WP6 (Valencia).
Since this is a deliverable of the project we must have a clear plan for how to finish them before the end of August, which is the date for submitting the progress report.
The title of the six papers, their lead authors, and a short description of what they would contain is:
1. Diversity and abundance of palm resources.Henrik Balslev (Aarhus).Compares the diversity, abundance and dynamic of palms in forests under different exposures and intensities of human disturbance, and evaluate the responses of the palm-communities to disturbance of of the forests.
- Ecosystem resilience and limits of functioning.Jean-Christophe Pintaud, Montpellier.Compares the functioning, productive potential, and diversity of forest remnants in different stages of fragmentation and degradation. Value the resilience of the systems partly by applying genetic variation of palm populations as a proxy; and by applying the diversity, abundance, and regenerative capacity of palms to determine drivers and indicators of regime shift.
- Products provided by palms to local people.Manuel Macia, Madrid.Documents the diversity and abundance of palm uses, the importance and value of palm products in local communities, interchange and incipient trade in these products, and present intensities of resource use. Estimates future needs of these products, and local people’s responses to changing or diminishing provisions of forest products and other ecosystem services.
- Small Industries and Trade Based on Palm Products.Maximilian Weigend, Berlin.Describes marketing and sale of palm products including “traditional” uses in regional towns as well as processed materials sold at national and international markets. Analyzes economic importance, potentials and implications of the processing and trade. Evaluates future demands, options and strategies to increase sale of these products.
- Sustainability and management of resources.Rodrigo Bernal, Bogotá.Investigates and compares ecosystems managed for the provision of palm products and defines indicators of sustainability and describe sustainable practices. Defines actions that may improve sustainability and management.
6. Policies and sustainable use and management.Renato Valencia, Quito.Analyzes policy and administrative practices related to use and trade of products from palms and other plants; and a sustainable management of the resource base.
When preparing the manuscript please follow the guidelines from Botanical Review. Remember that our agreement with the editor is, that we as a project, take the manuscripts through a review among the project participants, so please think of who could review your manuscript.
The idea is to subit all six manuscript as a package, so do not submit your manuscript individually to the editor. Once they are done we should send them as a package.
