Endemic tenebrionids (Coleoptera: Tenebrionidae) from the Patagonian steppe: a preliminary identification of areas of micro‐endemism and richness hotspots

Based on data from sixteen museum collections we listed the endemic tenebrionids that inhabit the Patagonian steppe. Then, according to the geographical location of the species, we identified areas of micro‐endemism and hotspots within this biogeographic province. Results showed 115 endemic tenebrionid species from the Patagonian steppe, 25 areas of micro‐endemism and five hotspots. We used these outcomes to identify areas of importance for conservation. Based on the comparison with other biogeographic provinces, we suggest that the Patagonian steppe constitutes a center of high endemism for tenebrionids. We hypothesize that the isolation of the Patagonian steppe from other arid areas would cause the high occurrence of endemism. In addition, we suggest processes that could be responsible for the origin of the areas of micro‐endemism and hotspots identified in this work.     

An assessment of the efficiency of protection status through determinations of biodiversity hotspots based on endemic bird species,Taiwan

Evaluations of species richness patterns have been performed at diverse scales, and biodiversity hotspots, especially endemism hotspots, have received much attention in conservation biology. We estimated the distributions of endemic bird species based on a 12-yr avian inventory project in Taiwan, identified biodiversity hotspots of endemism on a regional scale based on predictions from the ensemble forecasting framework and frequency histogram approach, and assessed the efficiency of protected areas. The results indicated that the predicted endemism hotspots were mostly located in mid- and high-elevation areas along the Central Mountain Range of Taiwan. An observed endemism hotspot was defined as one in which at least five of Taiwan's 17 endemic bird species were present. This criterion was used because the 5% of the sampled grid squares that were the richest in endemic bird species all had 5 endemic bird species or more. Seventy to seventy-one percent of the observed biodiversity hotspots matched the predicted biodiversity hotspots. This outcome was obtained whether the richness biodiversity in a grid square was based on summed predicted probability or summed predicted richness. The majority of the protected areas for these Taiwanese endemic bird species were national parks, protecting 24.1% of the predicted hotspot areas, whereas nature reserves and wildlife refuges protected less than 7%. Most of the predicted endemism hotspots were not adequately protected. We conclude that the ensemble forecasting framework and the frequency histogram approach are useful for selecting critical habitats and biodiversity hotspots for endemic species and for appraising the efficiency of the protection status provided by governments.     

Assessing Local and Surrounding Threats to the Protected Area Network in a Biodiversity Hotspot: The Hengduan Mountains of Southwest China

Protected areas (PAs) not only serve as refuges of biodiversity conservation but are also part of large ecosystems and are vulnerable to change caused by human activity from surrounding lands, especially in biodiversity hotspots. Assessing threats to PAs and surrounding areas is therefore a critical step in effective conservation planning. We apply a threat framework as a means of quantitatively assessing local and surrounding threats to different types of PAs with gradient buffers, and to main ecoregions in the Hengduan Mountain Hotspot of southwest China. Our findings show that national protected areas (NPAs) have lower and significantly lower threat values (p<0.05) than provincial protected areas (PPAs) and other protected areas (OPAs), respectively, which indicates that NPAs are lands with a lower threat level and higher levels of protection and management. PAs have clear edge effects, as the proportion of areas with low threat levels decline dramatically in the 5-kilometer buffers just outside the PAs. However, NPAs suffered greater declines (58.3%) than PPAs (34.8%) and OPAs (33.4%) in the 5-kilometer buffers. Moreover, a significant positive correlation was found between the size of PAs and the proportion of areas with low threat levels that they contained in both PAs and PA buffers (p<0.01). To control or mitigate current threats at the regional scale, PA managers often require quantitative information related to threat intensities and spatial distribution. The threat assessment in the Hengduan Mountain Hotspot will be useful to policy makers and managers in their efforts to establish effective plans and target-oriented management strategies.     

Biodiversity hotspots are not congruent with conservation areas in the Gulf of California

As marine systems are threatened by increasing human impacts, mechanisms to maintain biodiversity and ecosystem functions and services are needed. Protecting areas of conservation importance may serve as a proxy for maintaining these functions, while also facilitating efficient use and management of limited resources. Biodiversity hotspots have been used as surrogates for spatial conservation importance; however, as many protected areas have been established opportunistically and under differing criteria, it is unclear how well they actually protect hotspots. We evaluated how well the current protected area network and priority areas selected through previous systematic conservation planning exercises preserve biodiversity hotspots in the Gulf of California, Mexico. We also determined spatial congruence between biodiversity hotspots based on different criteria, which may determine their ability to be used as surrogates for each other. We focus on the Gulf of California because it is a megadiverse system where limited information regarding species diversity and distribution has constrained development of strategies for conservation and management. We developed a species occurrence database and identified biodiversity hotspots using four different criteria: species richness, rarity, endemism, and threatened species. We interpolated species occurrence, while accounting for heterogeneous sampling efforts. We then assessed overlap of hotspots with existing protected areas and priority areas, and between hotspots derived by distinct criteria. We gathered 286,533 occurrence records belonging to 12,105 unique species, including 6388 species identified as rare, 642 as endemic, and 386 as threatened. We found that biodiversity hotspots showed little spatial overlap with areas currently under protection and previously identified priority areas. Our results highlight the importance of distinct spatial areas of biodiversity and suggest that different ecological mechanisms sustain different aspects of diversity and multiple criteria should be used when defining conservation areas.     

Diversity of mammals in the tropical–temperate Neotropics: hotspots on a regional scale

The tropical–temperate interface of the southern Neotropics harbours an interdigitating array of biomes (Puna, Monte, Chaco, Yungas). This topographic and climatically complex region needs urgent conservation efforts, as it is being transformed by human activities at an accelerating pace. We analyse georeferenced field records of mammal species in northwestern Argentina (provinces: Catamarca, Jujuy, Salta, Tucuman) in order to define biodiversity hotspots on the basis of 0.5°× 0.5° grid cells within northwestern Argentina according to total richness of mammal species, richness of megaspecies (species above 10 kg), and endemic species (species restricted to Argentina or neighbouring countries with shared biomes). The mammal fauna of northwestern Argentina is fairly well known (176 species). The biomes differ considerably in species richness (Puna low, Yungas high) and species composition. We found no significant difference between endemic and non-endemic species regarding cell occupancy or body size. Cell occupancy was not correlated to body size. Across grids, species richness, number of megaspecies as well as richness of endemics are all correlated to sampling effort. More than 50% of the species in the region are restricted to one or two biomes. Overall, the species turn-over between biomes in northwestern Argentina is high. Using a simple algorithm we identified 10 grid cells which covered 90% of the total number of recorded species, and contrast them with the protected areas. While the Puna and Yungas biomes are rather well protected, the arid and semiarid Monte and Chaco are in need of urgent attention in biodiversity conservation.     

三江平原湿地鸟类丰富度的空间格局及热点地区保护

全球气候变化和人类的开垦开发活动使湿地生物多样性遭到严重的干扰和破坏,导致生物多样性空间分布格局及热点地区的保护成为研究的热点。在对三江平原湿地鸟类预测的基础上,利用空间自相关方法分析三江平原湿地鸟类丰富度的空间分布格局,并找出湿地鸟类多样性的热点地区及优先保护顺序。研究结果表明,三江平原湿地鸟类丰富度高高集聚区主要分布在保护区及周边地区、河流和湖泊沿岸,是新建和扩建自然保护区的最佳区域。湿地鸟类丰富度高低集聚区主要分布在农田景观中,将它们设立成微型保护地块对于区域景观生态安全具有重要意义;利用湿地鸟类物种丰富度、国家级保护湿地鸟类、生境类型和结构、距最近保护区距离、破碎度、干扰度等指标,在研究区内共找到13个热点地区,总面积为1018.7km²,占研究区总面积的8%;利用系统聚类分析,将13个热点地区划分成3种优先保护顺序。构建的小区域范围内寻找生物多样性热点地区的方法,为相关政府部门更有效地进行湿地生物多样性的保护和管理提供科学依据。     

Conserving Biogeography: Habitat Loss and Vicariant Patterns in Endemic Squamates of the Cerrado Hotspot

Little is known about the threat levels and impacts of habitat loss over the Cerrado Squamate fauna. The region is under severe habitat loss due to mechanized agriculture, accelerated by changes in the Brazilian National Forest Code. The Squamate fauna of the Cerrado is rich in endemics and is intrinsically associated with its surrounding microhabitats, which make up a mosaic of phitophysiognomies throughout the region. Herein we evaluate current conservation status of Squamate biogeographic patterns in the Brazilian Cerrado, the single savanna among global biodiversity hotspots. To do so, we first updated point locality data on 49 endemic Squamates pertaining to seven non-random clusters of species ranges in the Cerrado. Each cluster was assumed to be representative of different biogeographic regions, holding its own set of species, herein mapped according to their extent of occurrence (EOO). We then contrasted these data in four different scenarios, according to the presence or absence of habitat loss and the presence or absence of the current protected area (PA) cover. We searched for non-random patterns of habitat loss and PA coverage among these biogeographic regions throughout the Cerrado. Finally, with the species EOO as biodiversity layers, we used Zonation to discuss contemporary PA distribution, as well as to highlight current priority areas for conservation within the Cerrado. We ran Zonation under all four conservation scenarios mentioned above. We observed that habitat loss and PA coverage significantly differed between biogeographic regions. The southernmost biogeographic region is the least protected and the most impacted, with priority areas highly scattered in small, disjunct fragments. The northernmost biogeographic region (Tocantins-Serra Geral) is the most protected and least impacted, showing extensive priority areas in all Zonation scenarios. Therefore, current and past deforestation trends are severely threatening biogeographic patterns in the Cerrado. Moreover, PA distribution is spatially biased, and does not represent biogeographic divisions of the Cerrado. Consequently, we show that biogeographic patterns and processes are being erased at an accelerated pace, reinforcing the urgent need to create new reserves and to avoid the loss of the last remaining fragments of once continuous biogeographic regions. These actions are fundamental and urgent for conserving biogeographic and evolutionary information in this highly imperiled savanna hotspot.     

How well are biodiversity drivers reflected in protected areas? A representativeness assessment of the geohistorical gradients that shaped endemic flora in Japan

Protected areas function as a lifeboat that can preserve the origins and maintenance of biodiversity. We assessed the representativeness of biodiversity in existing protected areas in Japan using a distribution dataset and phylogenetic tree for 5565 Japanese vascular plant species. We first examined the overlap of species distribution with the existing protected areas and identified the minimum set representing all plant species. Second, we evaluated the relative importance of environmental variables in explaining the spatial arrangement of protected areas using a random forest model. Finally, we clarified how potential drivers of plant diversity were sufficiently captured within the protected areas network. Although the protected areas captured the majority of species, nearly half of the minimum set areas were selected from outside the existing protected areas. The locations of existing protected areas are mainly associated with geographical and socio-economic factors rather than key biodiversity features (including evolutionary distinctiveness). Moreover, critical biodiversity drivers, which include current climate, paleoclimatic stability, and geographical isolation, were biasedly emulated within the existing protected areas. These findings demonstrate that current conservation planning fails to represent the ecological and evolutionary processes relevant to species sorting, dispersal limitation, and allopatric speciation. In particular, under-representativeness of historically stable habitats that function as evolutionary hotspots or refugia in response to climate changes may pose a threat to the long-term persistence of Japan’s endemic biota. This study provides a fundamental basis for developing prioritization measures to retain species assembly processes and in situ diversification along current climatic and geohistorical gradients.     

Biogeography of freshwater fishes of the Balkan Peninsula

Delineating biogeographical regions is a critical step towards the establishment and evaluation of conservation priorities. In the present study, we analysed the distribution patterns of the freshwater fish of an understudied European biodiversity hotspot, the Balkan Peninsula. Based on the most extensive available database of native freshwater fish species distributions, we performed a hierarchical clustering analysis to identify the major biogeographical regions of the Balkan Peninsula. We also highlighted the ‘hottest hotspots’ of freshwater fish diversity across the delimited biogeographical regions by describing the patterns of species richness, endemic and vulnerable species; indicator species were also determined. The bioregionalisation scheme consisted of eight groups of drainage basins that correspond to distinct regions of the Balkan Peninsula. Overall, the delineated biogeographical regions varied in terms of species richness, endemism, vulnerability (i.e. extinction threats) and indicator species composition. From a conservation perspective, this study emphasises the prioritisation of areas characterised by high levels of irreplaceability (endemism) and vulnerability (i.e. the Attikobeotia region, Ionian Sea and Prespa Lakes) and stresses the necessity of implementing a network of protected freshwater areas across the Balkan Peninsula.     

Spatial mismatches between plant biodiversity facets and evolutionary legacy in the vicinity of a major Mediterranean city

The analyses of congruencies among biodiversity components address the issue of conservation priorities, but previously they have been done at coarse scales with limited relevance for conservation actions. Moreover, these former studies consider only the species level components of biodiversity and not the intra-specific evolutionary legacy that influences future biodiversity. This study represents the first assessment of congruencies between various components of plant biodiversity and the evolutionary legacy of a narrow endemic taxon (Arenaria provincialis, Caryophyllaceae). Assessment is conducted in the vicinity of a Mediterranean big city (Marseille, S.E. France) where habitats and flora are threatened by mass tourism and urban sprawl. Our analyses reveal that the different plant biodiversity facets assessed are spatially mismatched and unequally protected. Moreover, by using only species-level components of biodiversity as conservation targets we ignore crucial areas for the evolutionary legacy of this narrow endemic plant. Our results highlight the crucial role of phylogeography as a criterion to target the genetic precursors of future biodiversity in conservation planning.     

The impact of natural resource use on bird and reptile communities within multiple-use protected areas: evidence from sub-arid Southern Madagascar

Multiple-use protected areas, in which sustainable levels of extractive livelihood activities are permitted, play an increasingly important role in the global protected area estate, and are expected to rise in prevalence. However, we know little about their effectiveness at conserving biodiversity. We surveyed bird and reptile communities in three areas across a forest disturbance gradient resulting from charcoal production and shifting cultivation within a multiple-use protected area in Madagascar’s sub-arid spiny forest. We scored individual species using a Conservation Value Index (CVI; a simple metric based on rarity, threat and distinctiveness), and estimated the total conservation value of each treatment by calculating the sum of frequency-weighted CVI scores across all present species. Bird and reptile community responses to forest disturbance were idiosyncratic. Bird richness was greatest in the moderate-disturbance treatment, but the low-disturbance treatment had the superior conservation value due to higher frequencies of locally-endemic species. Reptile richness was the same in low- and moderate-disturbance treatments, but the conservation value of the latter was greater. The high-disturbance areas had lowest richness and conservation value for both groups. For birds, increasing disturbance levels were accompanied by community turnover from high-value to low-value species, a pattern highlighted by CVI that is masked by assessing species richness alone. Although some endemic species appear to be resilient to degradation, multiple-use protected areas in Madagascar may lose biodiversity since most endemic species are forest-dependent. Stricter protected area models may be more appropriate in areas where much of the high-value biodiversity is sensitive to habitat degradation.     

Biodiversity Hotspots and Conservation Priorities in the Campo-Ma’an Rain Forests,Cameroon

Until recently, patterns of species richness and endemism were based on an intuitive interpretation of distribution maps with very limited numerical analyses. Such maps based solely on taxonomic collections tend to concentrate on collecting efforts more than biodiversity hotspots, since often the highest diversity is found in well-collected areas. During the last decades, there has been an overwhelming concern about the loss of tropical forest biological diversity, and an emphasis on the identification of biodiversity hotspots in an attempt to optimise conservation strategies. Furthermore, the concept of sites of high diversity, or hotspots, has attracted the attention of conservationists as a tool for conservation priority settings. With the development of GIS tools, geostatistics, phytosociological and multivariate analysis software packages, more rigorous numerical analyses of distributional and inventory data can be used for assessing conservation priorities. In the Campo-Ma’an rain forest, inventory data from 147 plots of 0.1 ha each and 7137 taxonomic collections were used to examine the distribution and convergence patterns of strict and narrow endemic species. We analysed the trends in endemic and rare species recorded, using quantitative conservation indices such as Genetic Heat Index (GHI) and Pioneer Index (PI), together with geostatistic techniques that help to evaluate and identify potential areas of high conservation priority. The results showed that the Campo-Ma’an area is characterised by a rich and diverse flora with 114 endemic plant species, of which 29 are restricted to the area, 29 also occur in southwestern Cameroon, and 56 others that are also found in other parts of Cameroon. Although most of the forest types rich in strict and narrow endemic species occur in the National Park, there are other biodiversity hotspots in the coastal zone and in areas such as Mont d’Eléphant and Massif des Mamelles that are located outside the National Park. Unfortunately, these areas, supporting 17 strict endemic species that are not found in the park, are under serious threat and do not have any conservation status for the moment. Taking into consideration that with the growing human population density, pressure on these hotspots will increase in the near future, it is suggested that priority be given to the conservation of these areas and that a separate management strategy be developed to ensure their protection.     

Potential impacts of petroleum exploration and exploitation on biodiversity in a Patagonian Nature Reserve, Argentina

Petroleum exploration and extraction are common on the Patagonian steppe, but their impacts on the native biodiversity have not been properly evaluated. We describe both activities in a Patagonian nature reserve and consider their potential impacts on biodiversity. More than 2025 km of seismic lines inside the reserve resulted in 87.21 m²/ha (0.9%) of directly affected land, and 793 fragments of native habitats were defined with a mean area of 1.26 ± 0.74 km². Vegetation recovery on seismic lines is extremely poor. We discuss the role of seismic lines as barriers to native species, and their significance in encouraging poaching and the expansion of exotic invasive plants. There is a high degree of overlap between current petroleum activities and areas of special conservation concern (high erosion risk, vegetation diversity, abundance of endemic plant species, and habitat quality for native vertebrates). All these have a significant impact on the efficiency of the conservation area and highlight the urgent need to implement appropriate mitigating actions.     

The rarest and least protected forests in biodiversity hotspots

The goal of biodiversity hotspots is to identify regions around the world where conservation priorities should be focused. We undertake a geographic information system and remote sensing analysis to identify the rarest and least protected forests in biodiversity hotspots. World Wildlife Fund ecoregions with terrestrial forest were subset from 34 biodiversity hotspots and forest cover calculated from GlobCover data at a 300?m pixel resolution. There were 276 ecoregions in 32 biodiversity hotspots classified as containing terrestrial forests. When the first quartile of forest ecoregions was subset based on smallest extent of forest cover in protected areas, there were 69 rare forests identified within 20 biodiversity hotspots. Most rare forest ecoregions (45) occurred on islands or island archipelagos and 47 rare forest ecoregions contained less than 10?% forest cover in protected areas. San Félix-San Ambrosio Islands Temperate Forests, Tubuai Tropical Moist Forests, Maldives-Lakshadweep-Chagos Archipelago Tropical Moist Forests, and Yap Tropical Dry Forests were identified as the least protected and possibly most vulnerable forests within biodiversity hotspots. These ecoregions cover less than 500?km², forest cover is less than 50?km², and there are no protected areas. There is a need to update classifications and boundaries of protected areas, insure that islands are included in global land cover datasets, and identify levels of endemism and endangerment within forest ecoregions. This should improve our ability to compare, prioritize, and monitor forests in biodiversity hotspots.     

Evolutionary history of <Emphasis Type="Italic">campo rupestre</Emphasis>: an approach for conservation of woody plant communities

The campo rupestre sensu lato is among the most species-rich vegetation in the world, harbouring a high proportion of endemic species. We aimed to identify the processes that could generate a high level of phylogenetic diversity (PD) in campo rupestre for woody species and point out biodiversity hotspot areas which may provide additional information for conservation planning. We compiled a database of 2049 woody species from 185 community inventories. We calculated the evolutionary history using species richness (SR), PD, mean pairwise phylogenetic distance between species (MPD), the mean nearest taxon distance (MNTD) and their equivalents standardised (ses.PDss, ses.MPD, ses.MNTD), evolutionary distinctiveness (ED), and biogeographically weighted evolutionary distinctiveness (BED). Cloud dwarf-forests had the highest SR, PD, MPD and ses.MPD and lowest MNTD, while rupestrian cerrado presented the highest ses.PD and ses.MNTD. All areas are important for conservation, but the intersections between the hotspots should receive special attention in future conservation actions. The grids identified as hotspots by three or more metrics were localized mainly in Espinhaço Range in Minas Gerais State and a further expansion of protected areas is required. Moreover, the intersections between the hotspots obtained by mean ED and ses.PD are concentrated in the rocky dwarf forest and rupestrian cerrado, with considerable conservation gaps. The degree of protection of campo rupestre was low with unprotected areas comprising 56% of the species. Our results show an urgent need for increasing protected areas of campo rupestre in order to avoid the loss of valuable, endemic species with unique evolutionary history.     

Conservation of Freshwater Biodiversity: a Comparison of Different Area Selection Methods

The biodiversity of freshwater systems is endangered, especially in Mediterranean semiarid areas such as the south east of the Iberian Peninsula, whose rich and endemic biota is threatened by the development of surrounding land-crop irrigation. For this reason, the prioritization of areas for biodiversity conservation is an urgent target. In this study we used data records of water beetles from a province of the southeast of Spain for assessing priority areas for freshwater biodiversity conservation. We compare the performance of various area-selection methods, ranging from scoring procedures to complementarity-based algorithms, which are based on different criteria such as richness, rarity and vulnerability. The complementarity approaches were more efficient than methods using scoring or richness and rarity hotspots for representing conservation targets in a given number of areas and for identifying the minimum set of areas containing all species at least once. Within these, the richness-based algorithm was more efficient than rarity-based algorithm. Crucial target habitats for aquatic biodiversity conservation in the area studied are streams at medium altitude, hypersaline streams, and endorreic and karstic complexes.     

Low effectiveness of the Natura 2000 network in preventing land-use change in bat hotspots

One of the most important issues in biodiversity conservation is an exploration of the relationships among protected areas, land-use changes and biodiversity, so we aimed to assess the performance of the Natura 2000 network (N2000) in representing the bat conservation hotspots in peninsular Spain and the Balearic Islands and to compare the rates of land-use changes within these hotspots with those observed throughout the rest of the study area. First, we applied a Combined Index that integrates various biodiversity metrics (species richness, rarity and vulnerability) to identify hotspots, and once they were identified, we used null models to assess the performance of N2000 in representing them. Finally, also using null models, we tested whether the changes in land use (“anthropization” or “naturalization”) within the hotspots occurred at a significantly higher or lower frequency than in the rest of the study area; for this, we considered two temporal windows (1980–2006 and 2006–2012) corresponding with periods before and after the official designation of the N2000 sites. Our results show that bat hotspots are effectively represented in the Iberian N2000, but although land-use changes were generally higher in Spain before 2006, hotspots have not experienced lower rates of change compared to the remainder of the territory (regardless of the period under consideration). This suggests low effectiveness of the Iberian N2000 in preventing land-use change in bat hotspots, so to preserve the Iberian bat fauna, we encourage the urgent implementation of management plans to avoid intensive changes in land use both inside and around bat hotspots.     

Congruent spatial patterns of species richness and phylogenetic diversity in karst flora: Case study of Primulina (Gesneriaceae)

The karst landform in southern China is renowned for its high levels of species diversity and endemism. Globally, karst ecosystems are under threat from unsustainable anthropogenic disturbance and climate changes and are among the most threatened ecosystems worldwide. In this study, we used the typical karst endemic genus in southern China, Primulina Hance, as a model to identify areas within the karst landform with high diversity and to investigate congruence between phylogenetic and species‐based measures of diversity. Using phylogenetic information and species distribution data, we measured geographical patterns of diversity with four metrics: species richness (SR), corrected weighted endemism (CWE), phylogenetic diversity (PD), and phylogenetic endemism (PE). Our results revealed a high spatial congruence among SR, PD, and PE, with hotspot areas identified in the Nanling Mountains (i.e., north Guangdong and northeast Guangxi) and southeast Yungui Plateau (i.e., north and southwest Guangxi), whereas the hotspots of CWE are comparatively uniform throughout the geographic extent. The categorical analysis of neo‐ and paleoendemism identified a pattern of mixed neo‐ and paleoendemism in numerous grid cells, suggesting that karst areas in southern China have acted as both “museums” and “cradles” of plant evolution. Conservation gap analysis of hotspots revealed that the majority of prioritized hotspots (>90%) of the genus are outside of protected areas, therefore indicating the limited effectiveness of national nature reserves for the karst flora. Overall, our results suggest that the karst flora merits more conservation attention and SR can be an effective surrogate to capture PD in conservation planning.     

Ecoregion Prioritization Suggests an Armoury Not a Silver Bullet for Conservation Planning

In the face of accelerating species extinctions, map-based prioritization systems are increasingly useful to decide where to pursue conservation action most effectively. However, a number of seemingly inconsistent schemes have emerged, mostly focussing on endemism. Here we use global vertebrate distributions in terrestrial ecoregions to evaluate how continuous and categorical ranking schemes target and accumulate endangered taxa within the IUCN Red List, Alliance for Zero Extinction (AZE), and EDGE of Existence programme. We employed total, endemic and threatened species richness and an estimator for richness-adjusted endemism as metrics in continuous prioritization, and WWF''s Global200 and Conservation International''s (CI) Hotspots in categorical prioritization. Our results demonstrate that all metrics target endangerment more efficiently than by chance, but each selects unique sets of top-ranking ecoregions, which overlap only partially, and include different sets of threatened species. Using the top 100 ecoregions as defined by continuous prioritization metrics, we develop an inclusive map for global vertebrate conservation that incorporates important areas for endemism, richness, and threat. Finally, we assess human footprint and protection levels within these areas to reveal that endemism sites are more impacted but have more protection, in contrast to high richness and threat ones. Given such contrasts, major efforts to protect global biodiversity must involve complementary conservation approaches in areas of unique species as well as those with highest diversity and threat.     

Identifying Mozambique's most critical areas for plant conservation: An evaluation of protected areas and Important Plant Areas

Successful protected area networks must represent biodiversity across taxonomic groups. However, too often plant species are overlooked in conservation planning, and the resulting protected areas may, as a result, fail to encompass the most important sites for plant diversity. The Mozambique Tropical Important Plant Areas project sought to promote the conservation of Mozambique's flora through the identification of Important Plant Areas (IPAs). Here, we use the Weighted Endemism including Global Endangerment (WEGE) index to identify the richest areas for rare and endemic plants in Mozambique and subsequently evaluate how well represented these hotspots are within the current protected area and IPA networks. We also examine the congruence between IPA and protected areas to identify opportunities for strengthening the conservation of plants in Mozambique. We found that high WEGE scores, representing areas rich in endemic/near-endemic and threatened species, predict the presence of IPAs in Mozambique, but do not predict the presence of protected areas. We also find that there is limited overlap between IPAs and protected areas in Mozambique. We demonstrate how IPAs could be an important tool for ensuring priority sites for plant diversity are included within protected area network expansions, particularly following the adoption of the “30 by 30” target agreed within the post-2020 Convention on Biological Diversity framework, with great potential for this method to be replicated elsewhere in the global tropics.