WERA1008: Rangelands West Partnership
Statement of Issues and Justification
Rangelands are vast natural landscapes including grasslands, shrublands, woodlands, and deserts that are widespread throughout the U.S., accounting for 36% of the land surface. However, most rangelands occur in the 19 Western States where they account for 53% of the private and public lands (Hart 1994). Rangelands are varied and complex systems that produce a myriad of valuable goods and services, including forage and habitat for livestock and wildlife, places for recreation and scenic beauty, clean water, and energy resources from fossil fuels, solar technologies, and wind (Maczko et al. 2004). Many forces threaten the productivity and ecological integrity of these rangelands and the human communities that rely upon them. Threats include inappropriate grazing practices, damaging wildfires, invasive species, and intensive recreational activities.Demand for reliable and accessible information about effective management practices has never been greater as ranchers seek to diversify their operations and improve ecological and economic sustainability (Richards and George 1996). Federal and state agency land managers also have a pressing need for information to document potential ecological impacts of their proposed management practices (Vavra and Brown 2006). Against a backdrop of changing values and controversies over land use, greater understanding of innovative, sustainable rangeland stewardship practices is urgently needed. The geographic extent and many important resources of rangelands make their proper use and management vitally important to communities and economies - nationally and internationally. The Western Rangelands Partnership (WRP) is a group of rangeland scientists, subject librarians, and library technologists from 19 land-grant universities who have joined together to create an electronic service that provides accessibility to the worlds rangeland literature and educational resources. The WRP applied for WERA status and was approved as WERA 1008 in 2005. Since that time, the Partnership adopted a governance and operating structure for the purpose of developing a web portal [http://rangelandswest.org] to meet the needs of rangeland researchers, extension professionals, private and public land managers, policy makers and teachers and students. In addition, the Partnership applied for and was approved as an eXtension Community of Practice in 2008 [http://cop.extension.org/wiki/Rangelands requires an eXtension ID to access]
During this past year, the Partnership has undergone a complete review, including reassessing its technical architecture, developing a business Plan, and conducting extensive assessments of primary client needs in the U.S. Western region (Pfander 2008). The results of these actions substantiated the need for a complete redesign and expansion of the Rangelands West portal. One of the most requested new features was a comprehensive database offering quick access to the most current, relevant, reliable, and authoritative rangelands literature. Included in such a database would be the complete text (allowable by copyright) of journal articles, reports, guides, manuals, as well as images, data sets, and learning tools. At the same time, users want simple Google-like search capabilities that rank results in terms of relevancy and importance. As a direct result of this and other input, the Partnership has begun to work with information technology experts on plans for building the technical architecture to provide this new level of functionality.
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