BIOTA Southern Africa is located in Namibia and the Republic of South Africa. BIOTA Southern Africa has an integrated interdisciplinary research approach on biodiversity in Africa that includes the following disciplines: animal production, botany, climatology, modelling, mycology, remote sensing, socio-economics, soil science, and zoology. The project is active along an approximately 2000 km long transect that extends from the Mediterranean Fynbos Biome at the Cape, the semi-arid Mediterranean Succulent Karoo Biome, the arid Desert Biome, the semi-arid tropical Nama Karoo Biome up to the tropical semi-arid Savanna Biome. Based on this transect approach, the target area of BIOTA Southern Africa covers the entire area parallel to the main rainfall gradient, from the temperate Cape with its winter rainfall climate up to the semi-humid Kavango region of north-eastern Namibia. Within the three BIOTA AFRICA regional projects, BIOTA Southern Africa examines the most arid regions. Hereby, the project activities are located at either margin of the arid subtropical high pressure cell (wider Karoo-Namib region).