The Mount Malindang researches on vegetation and policies, which are carried out in the context of the Biodiversity Research Programme, are transforming to `second-generation research'. They therefore search for new methods as compared to what was done in the `first generation'. The mission in January 2002 focused on this transformation. For the vegetation research, this meant the introduction and development of new methodology on field sampling and vegetation analysis. For the policy research a qualitative step was made towards more in-depth interviews to gain insight into the motivations and power relations behind forest degradation and loss of biodiversity. In order to do so, an interview frame was designed. For both research groups, possibilities of enhancing the coherence of the research as a whole were explored.