Vegetation Information System
The NSW Vegetation Information System (VIS) will provide the NSW Government, its clients and the community with a central authoritative repository for native vegetation data.
Information about vegetation is used widely within government for a range of activities, for example, by the Rural Fire Service for fire management, by catchment management authorities (CMAs) for monitoring the effectiveness of their land-use planning, and by local government for environmental management and planning.
The VIS will provide users with consistent, reliable and integrated information about NSW vegetation by developing publicly accessible databases and standards, and by refining data acquisition, management and delivery procedures.
The VIS is made up of a number of separate components arranged under three topics:
What’s new
The VIS Flora Survey database (Phase 1) is now available online as a module of the new NSW Wildlife Atlas. Search and review over 50,000 systematic flora survey plot records using this application. Phase 2, when available, will support online data editing, analysis and export.
The NSW plant community type (PCT) classification provides a single unambiguous community-level classification for NSW vegetation type mapping. The PCT classification will be used in BioMetric-based regulatory tools (i.e. BioBanking Credit Calculator and PADACS). The PCT classification can be accessed via the VIS Classification database (version 2.0).
The VIS Classification database (version 2) integrates the management of PCTs with the NSW Vegetation Classification and Assessment (VCA) classification, BioMetric Vegetation Type classification and BioMetric Vegetation Condition Benchmarks database.
VIS development process
The VIS project has two stages: Stage 1 focuses on consolidating information into centralised and accessible databases. Stage 2 will take several years to complete and will fully integrate the vegetation information systems.
The VIS project is driven by user requirements (NSWVISUserRequirements.pdf, 522KB). It identifies and defines the major stakeholders for native vegetation information systems, their current business needs and details their requirements for a VIS.
The VIS project is funded by the Office of Environment and Heritage, Catchment Action NSW (2009-2012) and the Australian Government Natural Heritage Trust/National Action Plan for Salinity and Water (2007-2009).
More information
Access to the component databases is free. Some online applications require users to register while others have unrestricted access. Detailed explanations and instructions are available on the relevant pages.
Please contact vis@environment.nsw.gov.au.with questions about the VIS project, systems or resources.
Page last updated: 02 March 2012
