The mission of Canadensys is to unlock the specimen information held by Canadian university-based biological collections and share this via a network of distributed databases, compatible with other biodiversity information networks like the Canadian Biodiversity Information Facility (CBIF) and the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). In its initial phase, the network focuses on data from three of the most diverse and ecologically and economically important groups of organisms: plants, insects and fungi, the latter two representing some of the most poorly understood and inventoried organisms world-wide.
Canadensys is funded for its first five years by the Canada Foundation for Innovation (CFI).
