Crisis in INBio

[Michael Schmitt]

Dear colleagues,

until 18th of August, I have been in Costa Rica 
for six weeks, and I have been at INBio twice, 
talked to the curator for beetles there (Àngel 
Solís), and also to several colleagues at the 
Universidad de Costa Rica (UCR) at San Pedro. I 
can confirm that INBio fired 15 staff members by 
end of September, about half of them scientists, 
e.g. the specialist for Membracidae. I also heard 
that this is not the first wave of dismissals, so 
was the curator of Malacology laid off in spring 
already, the malacological collection was 
transferred to UCR. The colleagues at UCR are 
already concerned about possible further 
transfers of collections since they do not have 
the necessary facilities to house any more.

In principal, it would be no crisis to science if 
the collections of INBio would go to UCR. 
However, it is also (perhaps even more) a loss of 
expertise if the scientists in charge up to now 
will have to leave their field of work and be cut 
off the chance to transmit their knowledge to 
students and to the scientific community in 
general. Therefore, all taxonomists, ecologists, 
zoologists or whoever is interested in 
Costarrican biodiversity are concerned by the dramatic changes at INBio.

That much for the moment.

                                 Best regards
                                   Michael


>********************************************************
>George Beccaloni wrote:
>
>Dear All,
>I believe that INBio in Costa Rica is 
>experiencing a funding crisis and that they are 
>about to make many of their scientists 
>redundant.  Does anyone know any more about this?

*****************************************************************
* Prof.Dr. Michael Schmitt (Zoologischer Anzeiger, Editor-in-   *
* Chief; Bonner zoologische Beitraege, Editor-in-Chief)         *
* Zoologisches Forschungsmuseum Alexander Koenig                *
* Adenauerallee 160, D-53113 Bonn, Germany                      *
* Phone/Fax: +49 228-9122 286, e-mail: m.schmitt at uni-bonn.de    *
* http://www.museumkoenig.uni-bonn.de/mit/dnavmit.htm           *
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