The role of criteria in selecting important areas for conservation in biodiversity‐rich territories

Abstract

Aim To improve our knowledge of the process of selection of important plant areas (IPAs), a recent requirement of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation. The study was conducted at a hotspot of plant conservation in the European continent, using a comprehensive database of plant species distribution in the area.Location Spain.Methods We used range distribution data for 3218 vascular plants found in Spain, in the form of 10 km UTM squares, totalling 169,124 species occurrences across 5508 UTM cells. We identified IPAs by scoring threat status, endemism, rarity, phylogeny and species richness. We then performed two different analyses, with and without incorporating the species richness score of every square. Finally, a null model was used to obtain a general pattern of species occurrences, we computed an index of occurrence richness (SI), and then we selected a number of specific territories of different sizes to reveal differences in sampling effort within the study area.Results We identified IPAs in Spain according to the proposed scoring method. We detected a positive relationship among richness and total score calculated with the rest of the criteria. However, endemism and threat status produced certain specific effects for species-poor squares. Regarding sample bias, we detected over-and under-recorded areas. This bias seems to be due to the accumulation of field prospecting in species-rich areas in detriment to poor areas.Main conclusions We envisage two different approaches to address IPA selection in hotspots. First, we advocate a complementary scoring-mapping method for areas where a relatively large amount of range distribution data and plant knowledge is available. Secondly, as richness per se encompasses a great amount of biogeographical information, we suggest using species richness or any other environmental surrogate to delineate preliminary IPAs in poorly known but species-rich territories.

Conservation and sustainable use of the medicinal Leguminosae plants from Angola

“…The IPA programme is a mean of identifying and protecting the most important sites for wild plant and habitats, and also offer protection to a wide range of species including medicinal plants, and many common but declining species (Anderson, 2002). IPAs have been delimited for several countries (e.g., De Dios et al, 2017 and specifically to conserve medicinal plants (Hamilton & Radford, 2007). The identification of IPAs in Angola could be based on the presence of threatened plant species under criterion A or based in high concentration of socio-economically important wild-harvested species (including medicinal plants, food plants, timber species, etc.)…”

Towards identification of important plant areas (IPA) for Peninsular Malaysia. Methodology and future directions

“…A scoring procedure considers value in each grid corresponds to its importance in biodiversity (Walsh, 2016) that is based on one or more criteria such as species richness, rarity or habitat. A complementarity method is the most used method among problem-solving; by means of decision support tools (Marignani and Blasi, 2012) as well as prediction modeling and algorithms (Walsh et al, 2019;S anchez de Dios et al, 2017;Mendoza--Fern andez et al, 2010;Williams, 2009;Abell an et al, 2005). The latter is frequently used when there is a need to improve IPA designation produced by the scoring method and reduce biases in IPA selection.…”

“…The effect of the weighted score given by expert judgment to each criterion is not understood, therefore, a robust scoring system is needed to overcome this obscure (S anchez de Dios et al, 2017). Uncertainty in judgment could be uncertainty associated with limited information about the condition and uncertainty associated with fuzziness on phenomena (Malczewski, 2006).…”

“…In Terengganu IPA, the challenge has also existed in a form of bias from the herbarium database. Herbarium collections tend to exhibit under or over-representation of certain taxa depending on sites accessibility (Walsh et al, 2019), sampling methods and intensities (S anchez de Dios et al, 2017). Identification of species richness areas is often impressed with these biases.…”

“…Therefore, a complementarity approach may be used to mitigate the effects of biased data sets (Blasi et al, 2011). Walsh et al (2019) andS anchez de Dios et al (2017) recommended that the scoring procedure should be applied in combination with other complimentarity approaches to reduce biases. Marignani and Blasi (2012) compared the scoring procedure and complementarity approaches to identify IPA in Italy and suggested that a combination of both approaches could be an effective instrument in achieving conservation objectives.…”