1. Frank Howarth Future Directions for Taxonomy in Australia

2. Ageing cohort of practising taxonomists Declining numbers of practising taxonomists Focussed mainly on groups or families of organisms Significantly reduced university training available Declining numbers of jobs Largely people dependent, requiring substantial human judgement Larger more charismatic organisms (plants and animals) much better known at species level “Classical” or morphology-based taxonomy in Australia now

3. Significant skill shortage problems in handling large ‘inventory’ style projects (eg Census of Marine Life) Work and funding priorities historically focussed on ‘completeness’ or ‘filling gaps’ (eg in floras) and driven largely by the areas of interest of taxonomists Significant misalignment between taxonomic knowledge ‘strengths’ and emerging ‘problems’ Widely held perception outside of the immediate taxonomy field that taxonomic ‘problems’ have largely been ‘fixed’ ie enough is known “Classical” or morphology-based taxonomy in Australia now cont’d

4. Managing some crop pests (eg aphids) Detecting and managing invasive marine organisms Detection of potential invasives (eg on islands in Torres Strait) Conservation reserve location (marine and terrestrial) Location of corridors linking conservation reserves and other wildlife rich areas Typical “problems” which require species level knowledge to solve

5. Measuring effectiveness of catchment management strategies Rehabilitating degraded lands Impacts of climate change on species distribution Understanding evolutionary processes Typical “problems” which require species level knowledge to solve cont’d

6. The current paradigm

9. A paradigm shift

12. Develop and populate specimen databases (access to existing knowledge) Accelerate production of master names indices Strengthen national (eg ALA) and international (eg GBIF) methods of accessing databases Do prioritised inventories of the key parts of the biosphere Develop lab and field usable technology to access morphological and ‘barcode’ based taxonomic information (keys, terminals, pads, comms) Recommendations

13. Develop multifaceted graduate and post graduate programs that use elements of morphological taxonomy, DNA/genetic/barcodes, bioinformatics, ecology and modelling Develop career paths by creating jobs in relevant agencies based around these skills, and by using strategies such as targeted fellowships and post-doctoral appointments to develop skills Recommendations 2

14. Prioritise taxonomy funding, job creation and research effort by problem, not by group (unless a particular group is a key to a problem) or solely for ‘completeness’ sake Conduct constructive PR about the fact that many significant problems will require applied taxonomic knowledge to solve. Treat our existing taxonomists as living treasures and do as much as we can to utilise their skills for training and problem-solving Recommendations 3

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