Introduction

Abstract

This volume, ‘Tasek Bera, the ecology of a tropical freshwater swamp’, is a monograph based on research at Tasek Bera, under the auspices of the International Biological Programme (IBP) involving Japanese and Malaysian scientists under the sponsorship of the Malaysian National Committee for the IBP (MNC-IBP) which was initiated by the Malaysian Scientific Association (MSA). This collaboration was initiated by one of us (S. Mori) in 1966 at the Scientific Committee for Freshwater Productivity (PF) of the International Biological Programme (SCIBP) of the International Council of Scientific Unions (ICSU). It involved discussions between the Japanese National Committee for the IBP (JIBP) and the Malaysian National Committee for the IBP (MNC-IBP) and their respective sub-committees for freshwater productivity; a brief visit to Tasek Bera on 8 May 1968; a reappraisal of the proposal at the South East Asian Regional Meeting of Inland Water Biologists held on 5–11 May 1969 at the University of Malaya, Kuala Lumpur and the Tropical Fish Culture Research Institute, Batu Berendam, Malacca, organised during the Pacific Science Association Inter-Congress at the University of Malaya; a further prolonged field visit by two Japanese scientists (I. Ikusima and T. Mizuno) from August 1970 to March 1971; funding by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS); and, finally, an agreement signed between the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science and the Government of Malaysia through the Economic Planning Unit, Prime Minister’s Department on 26 September 1970, for a joint project of scientific investigations into freshwater lakes of Malaysia.KeywordsEast Asian RegionalJapanese ScientistTropical FreshwaterSouth East Asian RegionalInternational Biological ProgrammeThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.