Results of the preliminary guiding vote (“mail vote”) on proposals to amend the International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants submitted to the XX International Botanical Congress, Madrid 2024

The International Code of Nomenclature for algae, fungi, and plants (hereafter "Code", Turland & al. in Regnum Veg. 159. 2018), in Provision 2.5 of its Division III, requires a preliminary guiding vote ("mail vote") on proposals to amend the Code. The purpose of the guiding vote is to advise the Nomenclature Section of the level of support for proposals to amend the Code (Div. III Prov. 2.6). All such proposals submitted to the XX International Botanical Congress, to be held in Madrid, Spain, in July 2024, have been summarized and commented upon by the Rapporteur-général and Vice-rapporteur in the "Synopsis of Proposals" (Turland & Wiersema in Taxon 73: 325–404. 2024, https://doi.org/10.1002/tax.13114). In all, 433 proposals to amend the Code have been submitted to the Madrid Congress, more than for the Shenzhen Congress of 2017 (397), and in fact the largest number at any Congress since the Stockholm Congress of 1950 (550). Of the 433 proposals, 192 had one author, 119 had two authors, and 122 had three or more authors. Four proposals came from the Committee on Institutional Votes, 20 came from the Special-purpose Committee on DNA Sequences as Types, and 9 came from the Special-purpose Committee on Virtual Participation in the Nomenclature Section, the latter two Committees having been established by the Shenzhen Congress (Wilson in Taxon 68: 160–162. 2019) to report to the Madrid Congress. Ballot forms were distributed by the office of the International Association for Plant Taxonomy (IAPT), in Bratislava, Slovakia, via email. Emails were sent in February 2024 by E.K. to the 1252 members of the IAPT, to the 70 corresponding authors of proposals to amend the Code for distribution to all 167 authors, and to the secretaries of the nine Permanent Nomenclature Committees (Div. III Prov. 7.1) for distribution to all 127 Committee members. These are the three groups of persons entitled to participate in the preliminary guiding vote (Div. III Prov. 2.5). The deadline for receipt of completed ballots at the IAPT office was 31 May 2024. The IAPT office received a total of 201 completed ballots, all sent by email. This was considerably more than for the Shenzhen Congress (82 ballots) but similar to earlier Congresses (Melbourne 140, Vienna 166, Saint Louis 229, Tokyo 202, Berlin 160, Sydney 187). Of the 201 persons returning ballots, 131 were members of the IAPT, 100 were authors of proposals to amend the Code, and 65 were members of the Permanent Nomenclature Committees. There was considerable overlap between these three groups, but no person was allowed more than one ballot. All 201 ballots were included in the vote count, which was carried out by M.K. and E.K. No ballots were returned anonymously, so none had to be disregarded. Four ballots were completed unusually: one person voted "yes" on all 433 proposals; one person votes "yes" on 25 proposals, abstained (i.e. did not vote) on 1, and voted "no" on the remaining 407; one person voted "yes" on 4 proposals, "no" on 5, and "spc" on the remaining 424; one person voted "yes" on 79 proposals, "no" on 89, "edc" on 6, and "spc" on the remaining 259. These very large numbers of "yes", "no", and "spc" votes were counted, whether or not they were intentional. Table 1 below gives the result of the preliminary guiding vote for each proposal, in the sequence "yes", "no", "edc" (refer to the Editorial Committee), "spc" (refer to a Special-purpose Committee), and the total votes cast for that proposal (discounting abstentions), followed by "% no", i.e. the percentage of "no" votes in the total votes. The proposals are sorted and numbered according to the "Synopsis of Proposals", with the running number of their original publication in Taxon (i.e. 001–433) also cited. In accordance with Div. III Prov. 5.5, any proposal to amend the Code that receives 75% or more "no" votes in the preliminary guiding vote is automatically rejected at the Nomenclature Section unless a proposal to discuss it is moved by a member of the Section and supported (seconded) by five other members. For the Madrid Congress there are 106 such proposals, representing 24.5% of the total. This is a slightly higher percentage than the 22% (87 of 397 proposals) ruled as rejected for the same reason at the Shenzhen Congress, and considerably higher than the 14% (48 of 338 proposals) ruled as rejected at the Melbourne Congress of 2011. In accordance with Div. III Prov. 5.6, any proposal that concerns only Examples (excluding voted Examples) or the Glossary is automatically referred to the Editorial Committee unless a proposal to discuss it is moved by a member of the Section and supported by five other members. For the Madrid Congress there are 26 such proposals, representing 6% of the total, fewer than the 16% (62 proposals) at the Shenzhen Congress. This means that at least 301 proposals are to be discussed in Madrid (433 − 106 − 26 = 301). This is 53 more than in Shenzhen (397 − 87 − 62 = 248). An asterisk (*) preceding the number voting "edc" indicates that the Rapporteurs, in their "Synopsis of Proposals", have suggested a special meaning for an "edc" vote. With 201 ballots returned, the total number of votes on each proposal ("yes", "no", "edc", or "spc") shows the proportion of those who wished to express an opinion on that proposal. The lowest number of votes for any proposal was 137 and the highest was 171. We thank the IAPT for funding S.K.'s travel to Berlin in June 2024 for a planning meeting with N.J.T.