Expansion of Industrial Plantations Continues to Threaten Malayan Tiger Habitat

Shevade, Varada S.; Potapov, Peter; Harris, Nancy L.; Loboda, Tatiana V.

doi:10.3390/rs9070747

Cited by 19 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 40 publications

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“…The conversion of tropical rainforest includes small-scale swidden agriculture, rural and urban expansion, and large-scale commercial agriculture [ 40 , 41 ]. A major cause of tropical forest loss has been the conversion of secondary forest to industrial plantations including oil palm and rubber [ 42 – 45 ]. Future changes in land use are inevitable as human populations grow and the country seeks further economic development through commerce in agriculture and timber extraction.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Carnivore hotspots in Peninsular Malaysia and their landscape attributes

et al. 2018

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Mammalian carnivores play a vital role in ecosystem functioning. However, they are prone to extinction because of low population densities and growth rates, and high levels of persecution or exploitation. In tropical biodiversity hotspots such as Peninsular Malaysia, rapid conversion of natural habitats threatens the persistence of this vulnerable group of animals. Here, we carried out the first comprehensive literature review on 31 carnivore species reported to occur in Peninsular Malaysia and updated their probable distribution. We georeferenced 375 observations of 28 species of carnivore from 89 unique geographic locations using records spanning 1948 to 2014. Using the Getis-Ord Gi*statistic and weighted survey records by IUCN Red List status, we identified hotspots of species that were of conservation concern and built regression models to identify environmental and anthropogenic landscape factors associated with Getis-Ord Gi* z scores. Our analyses identified two carnivore hotspots that were spatially concordant with two of the peninsula’s largest and most contiguous forest complexes, associated with Taman Negara National Park and Royal Belum State Park. A cold spot overlapped with the southwestern region of the Peninsula, reflecting the disappearance of carnivores with higher conservation rankings from increasingly fragmented natural habitats. Getis-Ord Gi* z scores were negatively associated with elevation, and positively associated with the proportion of natural land cover and distance from the capital city. Malaysia contains some of the world’s most diverse carnivore assemblages, but recent rates of forest loss are some of the highest in the world. Reducing poaching and maintaining large, contiguous tracts of lowland forests will be crucial, not only for the persistence of threatened carnivores, but for many mammalian species in general.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Carnivore hotspots in Peninsular Malaysia and their landscape attributes

et al. 2018

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“…Furthermore, the extensive habitat loss especially to industrial oil palm plantations in southern Peninsular Malaysia is unlikely to cease in the near future (see Shevade et al 47 ; Shevade and Loboda 48 ). Hence, based on a small population size and decline, we propose to list P. femoralis as Critically Endangered C2a(i) (<250 mature individuals, continuing population decline, and ≤50 mature individuals in each subpopulation).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Faecal DNA to the rescue: Shotgun sequencing of non-invasive samples reveals two subspecies of Southeast Asian primates to be Critically Endangered species

Ang¹,

Roesma

Nijman

et al. 2019

Preprint

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16A significant number of Southeast Asian mammal species described in the 19 th and 20 th 17 century were subsequently synonymized and are now considered subspecies. Many are 18 affected by rapid habitat loss and there is thus an urgent need to re-assess the conservation 19 status based on species boundaries established with molecular data. However, such data are 20 lacking for many populations and subspecies. We document via a literature survey and 21 empirical study how shotgun sequencing of faecal DNA is a still underutilized but powerful 22 tool for accelerating such evaluations. We obtain 11 mitochondrial genomes for three 23 subspecies in the langur genus Presbytis through shotgun sequencing of faecal DNA (P. 24 femoralis femoralis, P. f. percura, P. siamensis cf. cana). The genomes support the 25 resurrection of all three subspecies to species based on multiple species delimitation 26 algorithms (PTP, ABGD, Objective Clustering) applied to a dataset covering 40 species and 27 43 subspecies of Asian colobines. For two of the newly recognized species (P. femoralis, P. 28 percura), the results lead to an immediate change in the IUCN status to Critically Endangered 29 due to small population estimates and fragmented habitat. We conclude that faecal DNA 30 should be more widely used for clarifying species boundaries in endangered mammals. 32 Human impacts on the environment have rapidly accelerated species extinction via habitat 33 degradation and climate change. Recent report by Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform 34 on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) predicts that climate change has already 35 affected the distribution of nearly half (47%) of land-mammals 1 . Conservation efforts are 36 urgently needed but are hampered by the lack of data for a large number of mammal species, 37 subspecies, and populations which face imminent extinction 2,3,4 . A typical example is Asian 38 primates for which 70% of the species are threatened with extinction 5 . Effective conservation 39 programs are needed but they require a robust understanding of species numbers and 40 boundaries based on up-to-date taxonomic information 6,7 . Unfortunately, this information is 41 lacking for many rare, globally threatened, and elusive mammalian species. Many lack 42 molecular data and collecting these data is difficult because invasive sampling that would 43 yield fresh tissues is often not feasible. 44This leaves only three alternative sources of DNA. The first is museum specimens, but the 45 number of samples in museums tends to be small and many were collected in the 19 th or early 46 20 th century thus reflecting (historic) genetic diversity prior to extensive habitat loss. The 47 second is tissue samples obtained from specimens that died of "natural causes" such as road 48 accidents. The third source of genetic material is non-invasive samples such as hair and 49 faeces. Arguably, faecal samples are still an underappreciated source of information although 50 they could be collected in good numbers during ro...

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“…TROPICS Vol. 28 (2) (1992)(1993)(1994)(1995)(1996)(1997)(1998)(1999)(2000)(2001)(2002)(2003)(2004)(2005)(2006)(2007), T b (2007)(2008)(2009)(2010)(2011)(2012), T c (2012)(2013)(2014)(2015)(2016) and Malayan tiger (Powell 1997, Shevade et al 2017, Bahar et al 2018, posing a significant threat to local biodiversity (Linder and Palkovitz 2016). Large-scale forest loss and fragmentation in the BZ and outskirt region due to land conversion to oil palm plantation resulted in habitat shrinking (Munsi et al 2010) and may lead to species shifts and biodiversity loss in the national park (Chai et al 2009).…”

Section: Trends In Forest Area Fragmentation Inside and Outside Ernpmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There is evidence that some PAs have undergone degradation, and this degradation is increasing, especially in the tropics (Chapman and Lambert 2000, Gaston et al 2008, Spracklen et al 2015. The forest surrounding the PAs is important for conserving the species richness within and outside individual PAs (DeFries et al 2005) including large terrestrial mammals, such as the Asian elephant and Malayan tiger (Shevade et al 2017, Bahar et al 2018. Endau-Rompin National Park (ERNP) in Peninsular Malaysia is an important habitat for such endangered large mammals, its current size is inadequate to sustain long term viable populations for the species (Robert Aiken and Leigh 1984, Clements et al 2010, Garland et al 2017.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Deforestation and forest fragmentation in and around Endau-Rompin National Park, Peninsular Malaysia

Foo

Numata

2019

Tropics

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Protected areas (PAs) are crucial for conserving biodiversity, but there is controversy over whether they effectively reduce deforestation because, for many of the PAs evaluated to date, pressure from deforestation occurred both inside the PAs and in the areas surroundings them. This is especially the case for tropical PAs in Southeast Asia. We examined the impact of a protected area on tropical rainforests inside and surrounding Endau-Rompin National Park (ERNP) in southern Peninsular Malaysia by mapping and analyzing forest cover changes and fragmentation between 1992 and 2016. The results showed that the forests inside ERNP were well protected, but greater forest loss and fragmentation were found surrounding ERNP, especially beyond the 10-km buffer zone of the park, due to large-scale agricultural land conversion, particularly for oil palm plantation. The deforestation rate in areas surrounding PAs in the region increased from 250 ha yr 1 during 1992-2007 to 1,700 ha yr 1 during 2012-2016. In the buffer zone (BZ), the deforestation rate was extremely high during 2007-2012 at 1,800 ha yr 1 , but decreased to 440 ha yr 1 during 2012-2016. This suggests that in this region, PAs might be ineffective against deforestation in their surrounding areas. Continual deforestation and fragmentation are expected to occur surrounding ERNP, threatening its protected boundary. These activities may reduce the effectiveness of ERNP for wildlife habitat conservation.

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Expansion of Industrial Plantations Continues to Threaten Malayan Tiger Habitat

Cited by 19 publications

References 40 publications

Carnivore hotspots in Peninsular Malaysia and their landscape attributes

Carnivore hotspots in Peninsular Malaysia and their landscape attributes

Faecal DNA to the rescue: Shotgun sequencing of non-invasive samples reveals two subspecies of Southeast Asian primates to be Critically Endangered species

Deforestation and forest fragmentation in and around Endau-Rompin National Park, Peninsular Malaysia

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