Create the General List of Taxa and Ecosystems within the Target Area
A valid list of taxa for a particular country is an elementary requirement for every kind of biomonitoring.
Currently, there are few countries without any kind of species list for at least the better-known taxonomic groups such as vascular plants and vertebrates.
But, in most countries, these lists have not been used in biomonitoring programs.
These lists are being compiled by enthusiastic individual scientists and therefore often lack regular updating and a uniform format.
From a biodiversity conservation point of view, it is evidently unavoidable that standardized lists of species, including on line global synonymic checklists, have to be agreed upon.
Several global initiatives (electronic lists of scientific names of taxa: Species 2000
[http://www.sp2000.org/], Integrated Taxonomic Information System [http://www.itis.usda.gov/], Global Biodiversity Information Facility [http://www.gbif.org/], Fauna Europaea [http://www.faunaeur.org/], Index Fungorum
[http://www.indexfungorum.org/]) that aim to compile or support the development of lists of scientific names are likely to fulfill this precondition in the future.