Liz Matos
Elizabeth (Liz) Merle Matos was born in England in 1938 and
educated at Haberdasher’s Aske’s School, Acton, Middlesex, UK. Liz completed
her BSc degree in Biology at the University of London, Birkbeck College
in 1964, whereafter she moved to Cuba and was employed as a Lecturer in
Genetics and Ecology in the Faculty of Biological Sciences at the University
of Havana, Cuba, from 1964 to 1970. Whilst at the University of Havana,
Liz conducted research on lucerne (Medicago
sativa) and the pigeon pea (Cajanus
cajan) at the Pasture and Forage Research Station, Matanzas, Cuba. In
1972, Liz moved to Africa and settled in Zambia, where she was Lecturer
in Genetics and Evolution at the School of Biological Sciences, University
of Zambia, Lusaka. Whilst in Zambia (1972-1975), Liz conducted research
on sunflower breeding under Dr Revagnan, Head of the FAO Oilseeds Programme
at Mount Makulu Research Station, Zambia.
In 1975, Liz moved west, across the border to Angola, where
she took up the post of Lecturer and Reader in Genetics, Evolution, and
Conservation and Management of Biological Resources at the Agostinho Neto
University in Luanda. Liz has been in Angola since 1975, and has lived through
at least two decades of civil war. She was Head of the Genetics Section
of the Biology Department from 1993-1997, and despite the war, continued
with research (national and regional variety trials, and the production
of basic seed of the hybrid variety “Kilunda”) in sunflower breeding between
1979 and 1987. Liz was instrumental in developing the National Plant Genetic
Resources (PGR) Centre in Angola (1987–1997) as well as the Luanda Gene
Bank—first as a “satellite” bank and later as the National PGR Centre.
She conducted several collecting missions to various parts of Angola in
both the early and mid-nineties. She was the Vice-Chairperson on the National
PGR committee from 1990 to 1992, and has been Chairperson of the National
PGR Committee as well as a member of the SADC (Southern African Development
Community) Regional Plant Genetic Resources (SPGRC) Board since 1992. Liz
coordinated the first National Plant Genetic Resources Workshop that was
held in Luanda in 1993, and has been the Angolan representative at the FAO
Plant Genetic Resources Commission meetings in Rome since 1993. She was
the spokesperson for Africa at the May 1997 Commission meeting on the Revision
of the International Undertaking. Liz was also the National Coordinator
for the Angola Country Report on Plant Genetic Resources for the 1996 International
PGR Technical Conference, and leader of the first provincial PGR workshop
at IIA Huambo for extension workers and NGOs. In 1996, Liz was the national
counterpart of the IPGRI mission to PALOPs (Cape Verde, Guinea Bissau, Mozambique
and Angola) to propose cooperation with Brazil for PGR training for PALOPs
in Portuguese. With all these responsibilities, Liz has managed to produce
several publications on Angola’s biodiversity and plant genetic resources
and attended international plant genetic resources conferences.
Liz was instrumental in saving the
Huambo Herbarium (LUA) collection in 1995 from deteriorating in the aftermath
of Angola’s civil war—an amazing feat considering the
conditions that were experienced in the country at that time. Liz arranged
for a large military aircraft, loaded with a truck, to fly from Luanda south
east to Huambo, where the specimens from the Huambo Herbarium were loaded
onto the truck, the truck loaded back into the aircraft and flown back to
Luanda. Currently, the specimens are temporarily stored in the Luanda Herbarium
(LUAI) for safe-keeping. The following is and extract from an article that
appeared in the WWF South Africa magazine Our
Living World in May/June 1996:
“The herbarium’s (referring to the
Huambo Herbarium) library was recently pillaged and some of its cabinets
damaged in grenade explosions. Books, documents, including some of the original
field notes made by Angola’s founding botanists, were later retrieved from
Huambo’s market where they were put up for sale. The project was led by
Dr Elizabeth Matos, a botany lecturer at the Universidade Agostinho Neto
in Luanda”.
What about her future plants? In
the short/medium term, Liz plans to establish (I) the National Plant Genetic
Resources Centre, and (ii) a national emergency collection and promote the
ex situ conservation of threatened PGR
resources, principally local landraces and farmers’ varieties. Her second
priority is medicinal plants. Her long term vision is the establishment
of a national biodiversity centre, linking all role players concerned with
biodiversity conservation. For all aspects of regional biodiversity conservation,
including in situ and ex situ, wild and domesticated PGR conservation,
Liz realises that the development of taxonomic capabilities is essential.
She sees immense value in extending phytogeographical mapping throughout
the region, sharing of regional expertise and the use of common regional
botanical databases. SABONET is indeed fortunate to have someone of the
calibre of Liz Matos on the team, and as botanists are humbled by her ability
to get things done, often under extremely difficult conditions. She is testimony
to the fact that if one has enough determination and drive, anything is
possible. May she be an example and inspiration to all botanists working
in southern Africa.
