This resource is part of the publication by Olson et al. (2004) "Terrestrial Ecosystems of the World (TEOW) from WWF-US (Olson)". It depicts 867 terrestrial ecoregions around the world classified into 14 different terrestrial biomes such as forests, grasslands, or deserts. The polygons represent the ecoregions, defined as relatively large units of land or inland water sharing a large majority of biodiversity. The datasets is made available from World Wildlife Fund (WWF) for the year 2001.
References
Olson, D. M., Dinerstein, E., Wikramanayake, E. D., Burgess, N. D., Powell, G. V. N., Underwood, E. C., D’Amico, J. A., Itoua, I., Strand, H. E., Morrison, J. C., Loucks, C. J., Allnutt, T. F., Ricketts, T. H., Kura, Y., Lamoreux, J. F., Wettengel, W. W., Hedao, P., Kassem, K. R. 2001. Terrestrial ecoregions of the world: a new map of life on Earth. Bioscience 51(11):933-938. doi:10.1641/0006-3568(2001)051[0933:TEOTWA]2.0.CO;2