A new world climatic mapping program to assist species selection Trevor H. Booth a,* , Tom Jovanovic a , Mark New b a CSIRO Division of Forestry and Forest Products, P.O. Box E4008, Kingston, Canberra, ACT 2604, Australia b School of Geography, University of Oxford, Mansfield Road, Oxford OX1 3TB, UK Received 26 November 2000; accepted 27 March 2001 Abstract A world climatic mapping program (WORLD) is described which can indicate locations satisfying up to six climatic criteria important for tree species selection. The Windows-based program makes use of data derived from a global 0:5   0:58 dataset developed by interpolation. It includes data for 67 477 locations and provides world-wide coverage of major landmasses excluding Antarctica. As an example application, a published description of climatic requirements for Pinus taeda (loblolly pine) is evaluated and improved. # 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. Keywords: Pinus taeda; Precipitation; Species selection; Temperature; Vegetation mapping 1. Introduction About 35% of the world’s wood supply is currently being met from plantation resources occupying about 3% of the world’s total forest area. It is expected that plantations will meet 46% of global demand for wood by 2040 (ABARE-Jaakko Po ¨yry, 1999). Selecting appropriate species for trial is one of the most important stages of plantation development. To assist the species selection process at particular sites around the world, several major international aid and forestry research organisations have collaborated and, at a cost of over US$ 1 million, have created a Global Forestry Compendium CD-ROM (CAB Inter- national, 2000). CAB International led the project in partnership with the Centre for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Plant Resources of South-East Asia (PROSEA), International Center for Research in Agroforestry (ICRAF) and the Oxford Forestry Institute. The project was supported by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research (ACIAR), (United Kingdom) Department for Inter- national Development (DFID), European Union (EU), Gesellschaft fu ¨r Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ), International Network for Bamboo and Rattan (INBAR), United States Agency for International Development (USAID), United States Department of Agriculture-Forest Service (USDA-FS) and the MacArthur Foundation. The aim of the Compendium is to provide ‘‘a knowledge platform directed at achieving the proper choice of species and treatment of woody species in plantation, agroforestry and natural forest systems’’. Two CD-ROMs have been developed; an initial prototype Module 1 (CAB International, 1998) was followed by the Global Module 1 (CAB International, 2000). Module 1 was prepared using information from >50 specialists, contained detailed reviews for 200 species and summary information for a further 400 species, and a searchable bibliography of >25,000 Forest Ecology and Management 163 (2002) 111–117 * Corresponding author. Tel.: þ61-2-62818259; fax: þ61-2-62818312. E-mail address: trevor.booth@ffp.csiro.au (T.H. Booth). 0378-1127/02/$ – see front matter # 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved. PII:S0378-1127(01)00531-X