IPS Endowment Grant Recipient:Mijoro Rakotoarinivo
from Cindy Adair
Ravenea sp. Brickaville, Madagascar
Each year, the IPS considers applications for grants from the IPS Endowment Fund. At the 2010 IPS Biennial in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, the Board of Directors awarded a small research grant to, among others, Mijoro Rakotoarinivo.
Dypsis coursii, Marojejy, Madagascar Photos copyright M. Rakotoarinivo, RBG Kew Volume 2.4 ∙ April 2014 ∙ Newsletter of the Inter
Mijoro is the Kew Madagascar Conservation Centre and Geographic Information Science Unit Manager and Palms Conservation Officer. According to the Kew web site, “the main responsibility is a database that contains Kew’s collection data for Madagascar and ensuring that the data are of sufficient quality for systematics research, distribution mapping, conservation assessments, ecological profiling and climate change modelling.” The overall aim of this research is “to improve the conservation management of endangered palm species and our understanding of patterns of diversity for Madagascar.”
Recently, Endowment Chair Cindy Adair reached out to him to ask about his experience. “The IPS grant for carrying on fieldwork really helped me in searching for palms across Madagascar. Thanks to IPS, several new species have been discovered in the wild and many others have been seen again in their natural habitat after decades of
uncertainty”.