Establishment of a computerized biodiversity/biotechnology network: the Brazilian effort.

Information technology plays an increasingly vital role in bioindustrial development and in the establishment of biodiversity conservation and sustainable management of the environment. Recognizing the need and importance of local and regional database developments, the Tropical Data Base is establishing an interactive biodiversity/biotechnology information resource. The system is linked to major international networks and information centres, and is based on a workstation system and personal computers. All software was developed to attend specific needs and to cope with hardware limitations, making the system adequate to other developing countries.