all living biological collections
Would this include zoos, aquaria and culture collections?
Based on my understanding, potential downsides here are the increased weight of complexity and the operational differences between institutions that curate living vs. dead biological collections (which promote a lack of connectivity between such institutions). Also, I think there are other registries in place for living collections. WAZA maintains a global network for zoos and aquaria. For microorganisms, NCBI’s BioCollections manages a list of 820 “culture_collections”. So, maybe the data is already out there.
Anyway…living vs. dead is one of the clearest distinctions one can make in the biological sciences (exceptions noted). I think No. 2, A catalogue of all preserved biological collections should be the initial focus and would be a major achievement in and of itself.