The Western Ghats reptile Conservation Assessment and Management Plan (CAMP) Workshop held in Coimbatore from 28 February to March 2011) at Karl Kubel Institute. A total of 245 species of reptiles were assessed, several endemic to the Western Ghats, and others occurring in the Western Ghats or in southern India. Species endemic to the Eastern Ghats and peninsular India were also considered in the assessments. 40 participants with expertise in the field represented 28 organizations in the assessments. While the 1997 Indian reptile CAMP organised by ZOO had several well-established herpetologists of that era, the 2011 Western Ghats reptile CAMP workshop had a fairly young representation with a majority of the participants attending the CAMP workshop for the very first time; many of them having developed their expertise in this field since the first reptile CAMP workshop nearly 14 years ago!

Regional conservation management plans are often developed with the needs of ‘charismatic’ species such as elephants, tigers or birds in mind. Other important species groups can sometimes be overlooked when identifying the sites for biodiversity conservation. The CEPF Western Ghats Ecosystem Profile highlights the gaps in conservation knowledge for several important taxonomic groups, especially reptiles and freshwater ecosystem. WILD got a grant from CEPF to Enhance the knowledge about the conservation status of globally threatened species in the Western Ghats, with a particular emphasis on reptiles and the project includes the following two components.

The Conservation Assessment & Management Plan / Global Reptile Assessment for Western Ghats Reptiles:
WILD and IUCN Reptile Assessment Unit along with other local collaborators will draw on published literature and the collective knowledge of the South Asian Reptile Network to coordinate the compilation of draft species accounts and range maps for each of the Western Ghats reptiles, which will subsequently be peer-reviewed during a 5-day workshop of national and international experts with a view to producing agreed evaluations of the current conservation status for each species. Accounts will include detailed information on the species as documented in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. The results will be compared and combined with results of similar ongoing global initiatives (eg. Global Amphibian Assessment) and the analyses will provide holistic conservation planning. Global assessments (including supporting documentation) resulting from the project for both threatened and non-threatened taxa will be made publically available on the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species and the South Asia Threatened Taxa Monitoring System maintained by WILD.

Journal of Threatened Taxa
WILD, the publisher of JoTT (on-line Journal) will solicit scientific articles from all Western Ghats projects for publication over four years. Additional strategies such as encouraging CEPF granting agency to encourage all grantees to publish as well as approaching all grantees personally will be started immediately. All articles will be peer-reviewed in keeping with the highest standards and finally accepted papers published within a month. A special theme on Western Ghats Biodiversity Hotspot for CEPF grantees will be initiated, which will be a section of every issue. Articles peer reviewed will be published in the special section as and when they are finally accepted reducing lag time in publication.

The intention is to encourage, over the next 2-4 years all scientific results emanating from the Western Ghats region, be it from the CEPF grants or otherwise, to be published at a rapid rate in the journal. The publication is intended to reduce time delays in critical finding publications and to make the entire study in the Western Ghats effective by quick dissemination of results and promoting actions on the field. The publication provides completion to projects and highlights the findings, the actions and funding agencies and their actions to the scientific and action committees. This journal will provide all of the above benefits and due to its rapid publication, research findings can be timely or immediate based on the needs and priorities in the region of Western Ghats.

Eastern Ghats Freshwater Biodiversity Assessment Project:
Biodiversity within inland water ecosystems in the Eastern Himalaya region is both highly diverse and of great regional importance to livelihoods and economies. However, development activities are not always compatible with the conservation of this diversity, and the ecosystem requirements of biodiversity are frequently not considered in the development planning process. One of the main reasons cited for inadequate representation of biodiversity is a lack of readily available information on the status and distribution of inland water taxa. In response to this need for information, the IUCN Species Programme, in collaboration with Zoo Outreach Organisation (ZOO) conducted the Eastern Himalaya Freshwater Biodiversity Assessment, a review of the global conservation status of 1,073 freshwater species belonging to three taxonomic groups ? fishes (520 taxa), molluscs (186 taxa), and odonata (dragonflies and damselflies) (367 taxa). Other groups that include freshwater species that have been comprehensively (i.e. all known species) assessed are freshwater crabs (assessed in 2008, and 57 species of crab are present within the assessment region), mammals, birds, and amphibians and their assessments can be accessed on the IUCN Red List.