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TROPIS: Tree GROwth and Permanent Plot Information System


TROPIS is the acronym for the Tree Growth and Permanent Plot Information System sponsored by CIFOR to promote more effective use of existing data and knowledge about tree growth.

TROPIS is concerned primarily with information about permanent plots and tree growth in both planted and natural forests throughout the world. It has five components:

  • a network of people willing to share permanent plot data and tree growth information;
  • an index to people and institutions with permanent plots;
  • a database management system to promote more efficient data management;
  • a method to find comparable sites elsewhere, so that observations can be supplemented or contrasted with other data; and
  • an inference system to allow growth estimates to be made in the absence of empirical data.
  • TROPIS is about people and information. The core of TROPIS is an index to people and their plots maintained in a relational database. The database is designed to fulfil two primary needs:
  • to provide for efficient cross-checking, error-checking and updating; and
  • to facilitate searches for plots matching a wide range of specified criteria, including (but not limited to) location, forest type, taxa, plot area, measurement history.

The database is essentially hierarchical: the key element of the database is the informant. Each informant may contribute information on many plot series, each of which has consistent objectives. In turn, each series may comprise many plots, each of which may have a different location or different size. Each plot may contain many species. A series may be a thinning or spacing experiment, some species or provenance trials, a continuous forest inventory system, or any other aggregation of plots convenient to the informant. Plots need not be current. Abandoned plots may be included provided that the location is known and the plot data remain accessible. In addition to details of the informant, we try to record details of additional contact people associated with plots, to maintain continuity when people transfer or retire. Thus the relational structure may appear complex, but ensures data integrity.

At present, searches are possible only via mail, fax or email requests to the TROPIS co-ordinator at CIFOR. Self-service on-line searching will also be available in 1997. Clients may search for plots with specified taxa, locations, silvicultural treatment, or other specified criteria and combinations. TROPIS currently contains references to over 10,000 plots with over 2,000 species contributed by 100 individuals world-wide.

This database will help CIFOR as well as other users to make more efficient use of existing information, and to develop appropriate and effective techniques and policies for sustainable forest management world-wide.

TROPIS is supported by the Government of Japan.

Jerry Vanclay