News
Situation of PROTA to change in 2013
In recent years, PROTA has seen its former levels of income generation decline. Because at present there is no prospect of a substantial donation or government contribution, in the coming year the activities will be gradually reduced and other tasks will be sought for the four employees of the PROTA team in Wageningen.
There are approximately 7000 useful plants that could play a vital role in food security, health care and income improvement for the 1.2 billion people living in sub-Saharan Africa. PROTA (Plant Resources of Tropical Africa) is a unique project under which the available information on these useful African plants is collected, validated and made available in books and an interactive database. PROTA also has a significant role in the preservation of biodiversity.
The many international partners involved in the project founded the international PROTA Foundation in 2000, when PROTA began cataloguing all useful plants. Two years later, the foundation began processing and publishing all information available on those plants. Since then, over 3500 plants have been published.
Like the Wageningen University Fund, the PROTA Foundation is an accredited and independent ANBI foundation, and it will continue its activities to the maximum possible extent. The foundation also generates income from a number of sources, such as the sale of books and other services.
As soon as new financial resources become available, the team will take up to the activities required or hire personnel to publish new plants and plant groups. At a minimum, we will be continuing to search for a solution to secure the PROTA legacy and the funding of the maintenance and management of the interactive database in the long term.
For more information, contact Roel Lemmens, director of PROTA, or visit the foundation's web site www.PROTA.org or the interactive database www.PROTA4U.org