ENBI (European Network for Biodiversity Information) is an initiative funded by the European Union, and has the general objective to manage an open network of relevant biodiversity information centres in Europe. This programme aims at being the European contribution to the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), promoting two main fields of biodiversity study activities:

• Making the biodiversity data freely and universally available via the Internet
• Sharing primary scientific biodiversity data to benefit society, science and a sustainable future

One element of ENBI (WP13, work package 13) deals with making non-European biodiversity data in European repositories globally available. Notably, because many European countries have a colonial past, a large share of global biodiversity information, especially from developing countries in the tropics resides in databases of European institutions (including museum and botanic garden collections). With a still very fragile infrastructure for taxonomy in tropical developing countries and a very limited number of well-trained taxonomists, there is a great need for high quality collections-based information among local (para)-taxonomists, conservationists and other users of floristic and faunistic information. Data sharing may take the form of making available (visible, downloadable, analysable) on the Internet, current names, digitised images and collecting data of selected specimens, for which there is an urgent information need in the developing countries.