The International Geographical Union, Commission Environmental

in environmental research between karstologists. The basis far co-operation is reciprocal knowledge. This inventory represents an effort to spread out information between persons working in different fields and belonging to different groups. Karstology and Speleology are the two faces of an environmental science that deals not on/y with the analysis of a peculiar natural "geo-ecosystem " but also with the discovery of the more hidden parts of it. In fact the karst environment is characterised by the presence of a "world without sun, " an underground network of cavities partly penetrable by mano The discovery and exploration of this more hidden part of the underground karst environment are the hobbies of a small army of persons who dedicated a large part of their free time to the exploration activity, the so-called speleologists or cavers. It is really difficult to say how many active cavers exist now world