The flora of Angola : first record of diversity and endemism

Abstract

Angola is the only southern African country for which a plant inventory has not been produced to date. The lack of a country-level floristic checklist has seriously hampered the estimation of levels of diversity and endemism, and other conservation-driven initiatives. This deficiency was addressed in a collaborative initiative recently concluded among over 30 international project participants. This paper presents the results of the project that aimed, among other things, to survey the Angolan flora as part of producing a floristic checklist. The study revealed that Angola has a total number of 6,735 indigenous species, and a total vascular flora of 7,296 taxa (including naturalised taxa), of which 1,069 taxa (997 species and 72 infraspecific taxa) are endemic.