Fundraising 2012/Translation/Mei appeal

Appeal

You’ve probably never heard of a tropical fruit called the seashore mangosteen.

Even in Malaysia, where it’s known as the beruas, it is rare. But the fruits have a unique taste and a single tree can bear hundreds of fruits in a year. At the not-for-profit organization where I work near Kuala Lumpur, we are looking for new ways to put the beruas to good use — along with other neglected and underutilized crops throughout the world.

In our research, we take hundreds of beautiful pictures of little-known plants. I realized that if only a fraction of these were shared on Wikimedia Commons, it would greatly increase the availability of information on rare and useful crop species.

So I've begun adding our photos to Wikimedia Commons, the free online media database. These images represent a unique source of knowledge. And now that they're available on Wikipedia, they can be used by students, botanists and crop researchers all over the world.

Now, my colleagues and I are reaching out to our fellow crop scientists across the world, encouraging them to do the same.

Wikipedia is a superb reference on so many topics. The best part is, it’s always growing. Thank you for helping Wikipedia thrive.

— Mei Jiun Kwek

Bio

Raised in Borneo, Mei Jiun Kwek now lives in Kuala Lumpur, where she earned her master’s degree in botany. Her thesis focused on the Rhizanthes species — a sister species of the parasitic Rafflesia, the largest flower in the world. She works at Crops for the Future.