If you have never heard of GBIF (the Global Biodiversity Information Facility) you are not the only one, but after this conversation you will be glad to have discovered it. Funded by the world's governments and free to access, this global network and data infrastructure is used to inform endeavours tackling everything from farming and food security, to disease control, to habitat restoration planning and so much more. 

Judith Ochieng is a Kenyan scientist who has spent the past three years coordinating a project to digitise data from four forested landscapes in Kenya, Ghana, Nigeria and Uganda, a partnership of 11 organisations. She speaks articulately and passionately about how the importance of information-based decision making, especially when it comes to conservation, and shares how her faith keeps her grounded and hopeful when the data so often paints a disheartening picture.