Pressure for the conservation of rapidly disappearing plants and ecological communities has provided botanists, systematists, and computer scientists from all over the world with a unified aim — the production of a computer-based information checklist for all the world's plants.

Progress has been rapid in recent years. From a diverse array of disconnected systems and databases, there now exists a single, internationally supervised organization with the priorities of the creation of a computer-based vascular plants action list and of a 'Common Directory' of existing databases which will run within the Internet network. This book describes the various needs of the users (whether botanists, conservationists, or those interested in agroforestry and natural products
research), how these needs can be met using existing technology, and how the systems can be implemented most productively.

The eventual aim is to provide international access to information on all the world's plants: names, classification, and geographical distribution, as well as information on genetic resources.