What is IUCN SSC IdSSG?
The Indonesia Species Specialist Group (IdSSG) is an expert group within the IUCN Species Survival Commission. Its members include experts and practitioners from various taxonomic groups and scientific disciplines across Indonesia.
IUCN supports governments in achieving international commitments such as the Convention on Biological Diversity and its associated Targets, and the Sustainable Development Goals, which aim to halt species decline. In particular, the SSC has the potential to strengthen the scientific evidence base for decision-making processes regarding species. Indonesian species experts formed the Indonesia Species Specialist Group (IdSSG) as the SSC's National Species Specialist Group (NSSG) for Indonesia. The NSSG allows SSC members who are already part of other groups to organize geographically, and also allows other experts, especially new ones, to join the Commission without having to affiliate with another SSC group.
The purpose of the Indonesia Species Specialist Group (IdSSG) is to coordinate experts and practitioners across Indonesia from various taxonomic groups and disciplines to support the government and other stakeholders in their collective efforts to reverse species decline through data-driven policymaking and decision-making. This group is urgently needed given the high level of biodiversity amidst increasing risks of loss and rapid economic development. It is also relevant and should be considered an opportunity to accommodate the growing number of experts in Indonesia and advocate for the use of science in critical decision-making to achieve national targets for the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework and the Sustainable Development Goals.
In a dialogue with the SSC Chair and other Steering Committee members in July 2021, we received support to begin preparatory work based on the initial development plan for the Indonesia Species Specialist Group (IdSSG). Subsequently, we discussed a pragmatic implementation roadmap for the establishment of the IdSSG, including substantial progress in stakeholder engagement. The initiation and development of the IdSSG were conducted through a series of discussions organized by the IPB University's CTSS.