In Europe, IAVS has the flourishing European Vegetation Survey (EVS), in North America the North American Regional Section, in Middle and South America the Regional Section for South America and the Caribbean, and recently an African Regional Section became active. However, Asia, the largest and most populated of all continents, still stays without a regional subgroup of IAVS, and we hope to change this.

We would like to bring together vegetation ecologists dealing with any vegetation type, from tropical to boreal forests, via savannas, steppes, deserts, tundra and wetlands to semi-natural and natural habitats, in any part of Asia, to discuss options of international collaboration. Our plan is to discuss the proposal to establish one (or two or three) Regional Section(s) of IAVS for Asia. Examples of existing Regional Sections and Working Groups of IAVS show that this format allows for multiple joint activities, such as organizing regional workshops and conferences, networking and cooperation on joint projects, joint research expeditions, organization of special features in international journals, and mailing list and internet platforms for job offers. All of this can benefit from logistic and financial support by IAVS, a truly international society of researchers.

We invite all vegetation ecologists based in or working in Asia, whether IAVS members or not, to join the Initial Workshop on the foundation of IAVS Regional Section(s) in Asia. It will take place on IAVS’ Zoom platform on Friday 22 April 2022 from 7:00-8:30 UTC (see https://bit.ly/3Gi3dmx for the time at your time zone). If interested, please register free of charge at https://forms.gle/zJF8sFtR8gcysvW96. This workshop is also a part of the activities within the first Asian Grassland Conference, 19–21 April 2022, organized by the IAVS Working Group EDGG (see https://edgg.org/AGC); if you attend this conference, use its online platform for registration.

We tentatively plan the following program:

• Welcome by David Zelený (IAVS Secretary) and Jürgen Dengler (IAVS Membership Committee)
• Presentation of IAVS, benefits of IAVS membership, an overview of IAVS Working Groups and Regional Sections, how they work, and how they benefit from IAVS
• Sharing of experiences by Milan Chytrý (Secretary of the IAVS Working Group European Vegetation Survey) and Reginald Tang Gurooh (Chair of the recently founded IAVS Regional Section for Africa)
• Questions from the floor
• Plenum discussion: Should there be one Regional Section for entire Asia or rather two or three Regional Sections and, if so, with which delimitation
• Optional: if we decide to have several Regional Sections, we may split participants into breakout rooms for each section to get to know each other and plan further steps

   

  The Initiative Committee:

• David Zelený (IAVS Secretary), zeleny@ntu.edu.tw
• Jürgen Dengler (Chair of the IAVS Membership Committee), dr.juergen.dengler@gmail.com
• Alla Aleksanyan, Academy of Sciences of Armenia, Yerevan, Armenia
• Didem Ambarlı, Düzce Unitersity, Düzce, Turkey
• Sumanta Bagchi, Centre of Ecological Sciences, Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, India
• Kwek Yan Chong, Singapore Botanic Gardens, National Parks Board, Singapore
• Behlül Güler, Dokuz Eylul University. Izmir, Turkey
• Yasuhiro Kubota, University of the Ryukyus, Naha, Japan
• Frank Yonghong Li, Inner Mongolia University, Hohhot, P. R. China
• Cheng-Tao Lin, National Chiayi University, Chiayi, Taiwan
• Alireza Naqinezhad, University of Mazandaran, Babolsar, Iran
• Arkadiusz Nowak, University of Opole, Poland, working in Middle Asia
• Marcelo Sternberg, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel
• Viktoria Wagner, University of Alberta, Canada, working in Kazakhstan
• Jianshuang Wu, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Science, Beijing, P. R. China
• Jian Zhang, East China Normal University, Shanghai, P. R. China