Alien species - a species occurring in an area outside of its historically known natural range as a result of intentional or accidental dispersal by human activities.

Base-line indicators factors that can be measured as a means of monitoring the condition or quality of the environment.

Biodiversity - the Convention on Biological Diversity defines biodiversity as the variability among living organisms from all sources including terrestrial (land), marine (sea), and other aquatic ecosystems and the ecological complexes of which they are part; this includes diversity within species, between species and of ecosystems. In simpler terms, biodiversity is all the living creatures, plants and animals, on and in the earth, water and air in a particular place. Biodiversity also describes the interaction between these living creatures and the area (ecosystem) in which they live.

Biodiversity feature - an element of biodiversity for which it is possible to set a quantitative conservation target, for example a vegetation type, a species or the spatial component of an ecological process.

Biodiversity planning - describes biodiversity conservation planning for regions defined using biological criteria.

Biome - a broad ecological unit representing major life zones of large natural areas or the biological component of a large geographic region. Biomes are usually characterised by characterized by its distinctive vegetation and maintained by local climatic conditions.

Biota - plants, animals and other living organisms of an area.

Broad Habitat Unit (BHU) - a land class that serves as a surrogate for landscape diversity (eg. vegetation pattern).

Buffer zones - areas of land in which development is strictly controlled.

Cape Floristic Region (CFR) - one of the world's six plant kingdoms. Covering less than 90 000 km² or less than 0.04% of the terrestrial surface of Earth, the CFR is marked by particularly high levels of plant endemicity. It is a global priority for conservation action due to threats to its endemic taxa. About 68% of its approximately 8 500 plant species are endemic as are 20% of the genera and five of the families. The area is home to 1406 Red Data Book species, the highest known concentration in the world.

Climate Change - refers to the variation in the Earth's global climate or in regional climates over time. It describes changes in the variability or average state of the atmosphere over time scales ranging from decades to millions of years. These changes can be caused by processes internal to the Earth, external forces (e.g. variations in sunlight intensity) or, more recently, human activities.

Coastal-interior gradients - regions where corridors of intact vegetation link the coastal areas to interior mountain ranges.

Connectivity - connectivity refers to the ability of connective corridors to sustain ecosystem processes common to linked patches.

Conservation - the management of human use of the biosphere so that it may yield the greatest sustainable benefit to current generations while maintaining its potential to meet the needs and aspirations of future generations: Thus conservation is positive, embracing preservation, maintenance, sustainable utilisation, restoration, and enhancement of the natural environment.

Conservation action - includes but is not limited to the establishment or expansion of protected areas. Conservation action should include engaging with all major landowners and land-users across a range of socio-economic sectors, to increase awareness of priority areas for meeting conservation targets and to ensure that land management and land-uses in these priority areas support biodiversity conservation.

Conservation assessment - the development of spatial data layers and the spatial analysis undertaken to identify options for meeting conservation targets. Conservation assessments should include the interpretation of this analysis for a wide range of stakeholders.

Conservation planning - planning at a range of spatial scales that aims to identify areas for biodiversity conservation, taking into account patterns of biodiversity and the ecological and evolutionary processes that sustain them. Conservation Planning involves conservation assessment plus the development of an implementation strategy and action plan.

Conservation stewardship - refers to the wise use, management and protection of that which has been entrusted to you or is rightfully yours. Within the context of conservation, stewardship means protecting important ecosystems, effectively managing invasive alien species and fires, and grazing or harvesting without damaging the environment.

Conservation targets - quantitive targets that tells us how much of each biodiversity feature needs to be conserved in order to conserve a representative sample of biodiversity pattern and key ecological and evolutionary processes.

Corridors - habitat, ecosystems or undeveloped areas that physically connect habitat patches. Smaller, intervening patches of surviving habitat that link fragmented ecosystems by ensuring that certain ecological processes are maintained within and between groups of habitat fragments.

Critically endangered ecosystem status - terrestrial ecosystems that have lost so much of their original natural habitat (more than 80% lost) that ecosystem functioning has to a large extent broken down and a significant proportion of species associated with the ecosystem have been lost or are likely to be lost.

Degradation - The lowering of the quality of the environment through human activities, e.g. river degradation, soil degradation.

Development off-sets - compensation for biodiversity loss resulting from authorised changes in land use.

Ecosystem - the totality of factors of all kinds, living and non-living, which make up a particular environment; the complex of a biotic community and its abiotic, physical environment, functioning as an ecological unit in nature. Ecosystems provide direct and indirect benefits to humans, e.g. flood amelioration by naturally functioning wetlands, the oceans' regulation of the chemical composition of the atmosphere, and providing habitat for commercially exploited species.

Ecological processes - ecosystems work because they are kept alive by ecological processes such as pollination, nutrient cycling, disturbance (e.g. fire), migration of species or soil maintenance.
Ecological processes typically only function well where natural vegetation remains, and in particular where the remaining vegetation is well-connected with other nearby patches of natural vegetation. Loss and fragmentation of natural habitat severely threatens the integrity of ecological processes.

Ecosystem status - ecosystem status of terrestrial ecosystems is based on the degree of habitat loss that has occurred in each ecosystem, relative to two thresholds: one for maintaining healthy ecosystem functioning, and one for conserving the majority of species associated with the ecosystem. As natural habitat is lost in an ecosystem, its functioning is increasingly compromised, leading eventually to the collapse of the ecosystem and to loss of species associated with that ecosystem.

Endangered ecosystem status - endangered terrestrial ecosystems have lost significant amounts (more than 60 % lost) of their original natural habitat, so their functioning is compromised.

Environmental Imapct Assessment (EIA) - the process of collecting, organising, analysing, interpreting and communicating information about the likely impacts of a proposed policy, plan or activity on the environment.

Fynbos - fire-adapted and drought-resistant shrubland largely confined to nutrient-poor soils in the winter rainfall areas of the south-western Cape. Fynbos is the dominant vegetation group of the Cape Floral Kingdom (CFK), one of the world's six floral kingdoms.

Genus (pl. Genera) - is the first part of the name of an organism used in binomial nomenclature. Genera are sometimes divided into subgenera. Each genus must have a designated type species. The generic name is permanently associated with the type specimen of its type species. Should this specimen turn out to be assignable to another genus, the genus name linked to it becomes a junior synonym, and the remaining taxa in the now invalid genus, needs to be reassessed.

Habitat - the home of a plant or animal species. Generally those features of an area inhabited by animal or plant which are essential to its survival.

Habitat fragmentation - ecosystems and the species therein, need a certain amount of inter-connectivity for processes to continue. If a specific natural area is broken up into smaller pieces, eventually species disappear and certain functions are lost.

Indicator species - a species whose status provides information on the overall condition of the ecosystem and of other species in that ecosystem.

Landscape - the patterns and structure of a specific geographic area or place, including its natural, physical, built and socio-economic environments.

Least threatened ecosystem status - these ecosystems have lost only a small proportion (more than 80 % remains) of their original natural habitat, and are largely intact.

Map scale - the relationship between the dimensions of a map and the part of the Earth being represented on the map. It is usually expressed as a ratio between a distance on the map and the actual distance on the ground.

Protected area - a legally established land or water area under either public or private ownership that is regulated and managed to achieve specific conservation objectives.

Red Data Book - contains data on the threat to and rarity of plant and animals species. For each species, data is provided on rarity status, (i.e. endangered, vulnerable, rare, out-of-danger, and indeterminate), geographical distribution, population size, habitat, breeding rate and any conservation measures taken to protect the species.

Renosterveld - occurs only in the Western Cape and is the second major vegetation grouping in the fynbos biome. Renosterveld is one of South Africa's most threatened vegetation types. It gets its name from the renosterbos Elytropappus rhinocerotis, and is typically confined to fine-grained soils (mainly clays and silts)derived from shales.

Restoration - the return of an ecosystem or habitat to its original community structure, natural complement of species, and natural functions.

Species - a group of organisms capable of interbreeding freely with each other but not with members of other species.

Specimen - is an individual animal, plant or microorganism used as a representative to study the properties of the whole population of that species.

Stakeholders - people and organisations that are involved or interested in an area or an issue, e.g. residents, politicians, private sector.

Sustainable development - development that meets the needs of both present and future development, equitably. In terms of the National Environmental Management Act 107 of 1998, sustainable development is the integration of social, economic and environmental factors into planning, implementation and decision-making so as to ensure that development serves present and future generations.

Systematic conservation plan - an approach to conservation that prioritises actions by setting quantitative targets for biodiversity features such as broad habitat units or vegetation types. It is premised on conserving a representative sample of biodiversity pattern, including species and habitats (the principle of representation), as well as the ecological and evolutionary processes that maintain biodiversity over time (the principle of persistence).

Taxon (pl. Taxa) - the named classification unit (e.g. Homo sapiens, Hominidae, or Mammalia) to which individuals, or sets of species, are assigned.

Taxonomy - the naming and assignment of organisms to taxa.

Transformation - refers to the adverse changes to biodiversity, typically habitats or ecosystems, through processes such as cultivation, forestry, drainage of wetlands, urban development or invasion by alien plants or animals. Transformation results in habitat fragmentation (i.e. the breaking up of a continuous habitat, ecosystem, or land-use type into smaller fragments).

Ubiquitous - present, or seeming to be present everywhere at the same time.

Upland-lowland gradients - areas of natural vegetation which provide a continuous corridor from low-lying valleys up into mountainous areas.

Vulnerable ecosystem status - vulnerable terrestrial ecosystems have lost some (more than 60 % remains) of their original natural habitat, and their functioning will be compromised if they continue to lose natural habitat.

Wetlands - a collective term used to describe lands that are sometimes or always covered by shallow water or have saturated soils. Collectively, wetlands and their associated vegetation are highly diverse and productive ecosystems and despite their invaluable social and environmental roles, wetlands have been identified as being among southern Africa's most threatened and neglected habitats.

Zoology - the science, or branch of biology, that deals with animals, their life, structure, growth, classification, etc.