The world is currently facing an unprecedented loss of biodiversity with about one million animal and plant species currently being threatened with extinction. In addition, the average abundance of many native species has been declining rapidly over the last few decades and knowledge about Earth’s actual biodiversity is still fragmentary. This is particularly true for the “Global South” and especially with regard to less charismatic taxa. Zambia is no exception; the general distribution and genetic characterization of plant and animal species have not yet been comprehensively examined.

In the framework of the OeAD project “Inventorying biodiversity in the tropics: Establishing a DNA-barcoding pipeline for characterizing and monitoring Zambia’s biodiversity” Austrian barcoding experts will help local scientists to establish a DNA barcoding pipeline to barcode Zambia’s biodiversity as basis of future monitorings. The pipeline will optimize the process of species identification for Zambian taxa and make it more cost and time efficient. It will be tested in a pilot study where fish and dragonflies, species groups with a potential as umbrella/indicator species for conservation management, of the Kafue drainage will be barcoded. In October 2022, a workshop was held at the University of Zambia (UNZA) in which the entire process of creating DNA barcoding reference data was taught in theory and practice (-> blog article on the workshop).