A Flora is a tool primarily serving the need for plant identification. It also provides basic information on each species and often acts as a crucial entry to additional data. As such, Flora’s are essential not only to a wide variety of biological research fields, but also in conservation and management. In tropical Africa, the western and eastern regions are covered by several major Flora’s that are complete (Fl. W. trop. Afr., Fl. Trop. E. Africa, Fl. Ethiop., Fl. Somalia, Fl. Tchad) or almost so (Fl. Zamb.). Halfway the previous century, three major Flora series related to C. Africa, Flore du Cameroun, Flore du Gabon, Flore d’Afrique centrale, were started up. All have shown rapid progress at the start, with a notable decline in speed after several decades, leading to an asymptotic production curve. An exception is the Flora of Rwanda, completed in 4 vols, published in 1978-1987 and treating 2383 native species. Flore du Gabon is now well ahead of the other two, with c. 84% treated. The Central African Republic and the Republic of the Congo still remain without any Flora initiative to date. Despite major efforts, and even specific funding, progress of the C. African Flora’s remains slow. Although producing a Flora account is no longer a priority for many taxonomic specialists, the need to reliably identify plant material remains high. The development of e-Flora’s and standards like World Flora Online may support, but probably not speed up the production. Having in mind the huge importance of correctly identified plant material, along with the dwindling taxonomic capacities worldwide, the potential role of identification by image recognition is briefly discussed.