Professor Leslie Christidis

This chapter examines how biodiversity corridors can be effectively managed to enhance ecological connectivity while delivering tangible benefits to local communities. Focusing on Vietnam’s Central Annamite Landscape, it explores how corridors serve as critical linkages between protected areas, supporting species movement and resilience in the face of habitat fragmentation and climate change. Drawing on spatial modeling and field research, the chapter highlights the importance of community engagement, equitable benefit-sharing mechanisms, and supportive policy frameworks. It discusses the role of non-timber forest products (NTFPs), Payment for Forest Environmental Services (PFES), and conservation incentives in improving local livelihoods. The chapter offers practical insights into integrating ecological and socioeconomic objectives, proposing governance models that align conservation priorities with the community development goals.

Taxonomy, or systematics,¹ is perhaps the most fundamental biological discipline - more or less all other realms of the life sciences, from molecular biology and genetics to physiology, morphology and ecology, depend in one way or another on taxonomic information. Among the first of the biological sciences to develop modern standards - to this day, we by and large follow the procedures standardised by Linnaeus in the 18th century - taxonomy was for a long time the core discipline of what is today called biology. However, taxonomy's appeal has waned. Other disciplines have taken the lead in biology, and most of the public funding with it. While support for these disciplines is well justified, taxonomy's wallflower image is not. Many biological disciplines still rely heavily on the classifications (and related understanding of the evolutionary relationships among taxa) provided by taxonomists. While less popular than it was, taxonomy remains a cutting-edge scientific discipline that uses the latest theoretically and technologically rigorous methods to bring order to the Tree of Life.