Climate change, land-use changes and other anthropogenic pressures are globally the major drivers of biodiversity decline with profound implications, especially for the fragile Himalayan ecosystems. These drivers, if factored into the biodiversity conservation models, significantly improve their reliability and help a great deal prioritise habitats for better management. Here we focussed on an important medicinal plant species (Trillium govanianum), endemic to Himalayan region that is beset with the twin challenge of climate change and growing human footprint. We predicted the current and future projection of the distribution range of this species using SDM tool 'MaxEnt' supplemented with 'Zonation' software and 'human pressure index'. Decrease in the potential geographic range of T. govanianum, with a narrow room for conservation due to anthropogenic pressures in the predicted suitable habitats, was clearly revealed from our results. We identified the precise zones within the predicted suitable habitats under the future climatic scenarios (2050 and 2070) for priority conservation to endure the impact of climate change and growing human pressures. These results hold considerable promise in designing the effective conservation strategies for the target species. In the context of post 2020 biodiversity outlook, we advocate augmenting the species distribution models with human footprint index, zonation analysis and the climate change scenarios, to realistically meet the desired conservation targets.

A lack of precise information about the threat status of species hampers their effective conservation. The Target 2 of the Convention on Biological Diversity calls for evaluation of threat status at global, national and regional levels to identify plant species of urgent conservation concern. Here we have empirically assessed the threat status of three valuable medicinal plant species (Trillium govanianum, Rheum tibeticum, and Arnebia euchroma) through extensive field studies and herbarium consultations in Kashmir Himalaya and cold desert region of Trans-Himalayan Ladakh. In accordance with the IUCN Red List categories and criteria, each of the three target species turned out to be Near Threatened (NT). According to the NatureServe Conservation Status Assessment, each of these species faces the overall threat impact of «High» to «Very high». We found that the anthropogenic threats emanating from unplanned economic development, road construction and other infrastructure related projects contribute to a fast decline in natural populations of these three species. Keeping in view the value of these species, on the one hand, and growing threats to their survival in the wild, on the other one, we call for urgent conservation strategies in the vulnerable Himalayan habitats for regional socio-economic development.

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