Nonhuman primates, our closest biological relatives, play important roles in the livelihoods, cultures, and religions of many societies and offer unique insights into human evolution, biology, behavior, and the threat of emerging diseases. They are an essential component of tropical biodiversity, contributing to forest regeneration and ecosystem health. Current information shows the existence of 504 species in 79 genera distributed in the Neotropics, mainland Africa, Madagascar, and Asia. Alarmingly, ~60% of primate species are now threatened with extinction and ~75% have declining populations. This situation is the result of escalating anthropogenic pressures on primates and their habitats—mainly global and local market demands, leading to extensive habitat loss through the expansion of industrial agriculture, large-scale cattle ranching, logging, oil and gas drilling, mining, dam building, and the construction of new road networks in primate range regions. Other important drivers are increased bushmeat hunting and the illegal trade of primates as pets and primate body parts, along with emerging threats, such as climate change and anthroponotic diseases. Often, these pressures act in synergy, exacerbating primate population declines. Given that primate range regions overlap extensively with a large, and rapidly growing, human population characterized by high levels of poverty, global attention is needed immediately to reverse the looming risk of primate extinctions and to attend to local human needs in sustainable ways. Raising global scientific and public awareness of the plight of the world’s primates and the costs of their loss to ecosystem health and human society is imperative.

/pdf/impending-extinction-crisis-of-the-world-s-primates-why-32dorf7ucr.pdf

Impending extinction crisis of the world's primates: why primates matter

/pdf/eurasia-journal-of-mathematics-science-technology-education-xir8jfctxb.pdf

Eurasia Journal of Mathematics, Science & Technology Education

Environmental education outcomes for conservation: A systematic review

Primates occur in 90 countries, but four-Brazil, Madagascar, Indonesia, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC)-harbor 65% of the world's primate species (439) and 60% of these primates are Threatened, Endangered, or Critically Endangered (IUCN Red List of Threatened Species 2017-3). Considering their importance for global primate conservation, we examine the anthropogenic pressures each country is facing that place their primate populations at risk. Habitat loss and fragmentation are main threats to primates in Brazil, Madagascar, and Indonesia. However, in DRC hunting for the commercial bushmeat trade is the primary threat. Encroachment on primate habitats driven by local and global market demands for food and non-food commodities hunting, illegal trade, the proliferation of invasive species, and human and domestic-animal borne infectious diseases cause habitat loss, population declines, and extirpation. Modeling agricultural expansion in the 21st century for the four countries under a worst-case-scenario, showed a primate range contraction of 78% for Brazil, 72% for Indonesia, 62% for Madagascar, and 32% for DRC. These pressures unfold in the context of expanding human populations with low levels of development. Weak governance across these four countries may limit effective primate conservation planning. We examine landscape and local approaches to effective primate conservation policies and assess the distribution of protected areas and primates in each country. Primates in Brazil and Madagascar have 38% of their range inside protected areas, 17% in Indonesia and 14% in DRC, suggesting that the great majority of primate populations remain vulnerable. We list the key challenges faced by the four countries to avert primate extinctions now and in the future. In the short term, effective law enforcement to stop illegal hunting and illegal forest destruction is absolutely key. Long-term success can only be achieved by focusing local and global public awareness, and actively engaging with international organizations, multinational businesses and consumer nations to reduce unsustainable demands on the environment. Finally, the four primate range countries need to ensure that integrated, sustainable land-use planning for economic development includes the maintenance of biodiversity and intact, functional natural ecosystems.

/pdf/primates-in-peril-the-significance-of-brazil-madagascar-1ipqlwykiq.pdf

Primates in peril: the significance of Brazil, Madagascar, Indonesia and the Democratic Republic of the Congo for global primate conservation

Environmental education is widely used to increase awareness of conservation issues. The theory is that increasing knowledge will improve attitudes towards the environment. Often, environmental education is aimed at children with the assumption that this can also impact adults through intergenerational transfer of knowledge and attitudes. However, there are few detailed studies evaluating the effectiveness of environmental education on changing knowledge and attitudes, and whether any changes do transfer between generations. We evaluate the effect of a school-based education programme run by Malagasy researchers aimed at promoting lemur conservation in Eastern Madagascar. We assess changes in the knowledge and attitudes of participating children and their parents (surveying 126 children and 88 parents across four matched villages, 1 year after two of the villages received environmental education). There was very low awareness of the law protecting lemurs. Attitudes towards lemurs varied between species; with the aye-aye (considered scary) and the eastern lesser bamboo lemur (considered a pest) being less preferred. Children in villages who received environmental education had higher knowledge about lemurs and more positive attitudes than children in the villages not exposed to the environmental education. Knowledge about lemurs among parents where children had received environmental education was also higher (although not attitudes). Environmental education programmes can have a lasting effect, certainly on knowledge, but engagement of the research and NGO community is needed to build the capacity of teachers in rural areas to enthuse their pupils about ecology and conservation issues.

The effects of environmental education on children's and parents' knowledge and attitudes towards lemurs in rural Madagascar

Few Malagasy children and adults are aware of the rare and unique fauna and flora indigenous to their island-continent, including flagship lemur species. Even the Malagasy ancestral proverbs never mentioned lemurs, but these same proverbs talked about the now extinct hippopotamus. Madagascar's geography, history, and economic constraints contribute to severe biodiversity loss. Deforestation on Madagascar is reported to be over 100,000 ha/year, with only 10–15% of the island retaining natural forest [Green & Sussman, 1990]. Educating children, teacher-training, and community projects about environmental and conservation efforts to protect the remaining natural habitats of endangered lemur species provide a basis for long-term changes in attitudes and practices. Case studies of three conservation education projects located in different geographical regions of Madagascar, Centre ValBio, Madagacar Wildlife Conservation Alaotra Comic Book Project, and The Ako Book Project, are presented together with their ongoing stages of development, assessment, and outcomes. We argue that while nongovernmental organizational efforts are and will be very important, the Ministry of Education urgently needs to incorporate biodiversity education in the curriculum at all levels, from primary school to university. Am. J. Primatol. 72:391–406, 2010. © 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

/pdf/conservation-education-in-madagascar-three-case-studies-in-nj221hxpg8.pdf

Conservation education in Madagascar: three case studies in the biologically diverse island-continent.

Few Malagasy children and adults are aware of the rare and unique fauna and flora indigenous to their island-continent, including flagship lemur species. Even the Malagasy ancestral proverbs never mentioned lemurs, but these same proverbs talked about the now extinct hippopotamus. Madagascar’s geography, history, and economic constraints contribute to severe biodiversity loss. Deforestation on Madagascar is reported to be over 100,000 ha/year, with only 10‐15% of the island retaining natural forest [Green & Sussman, 1990]. Educating children, teacher-training, and community projects about environmental and conservation efforts to protect the remaining natural habitats of endangered lemur species provide a basis for long-term changes in attitudes and practices. Case studies of three conservation education projects located in different geographical regions of Madagascar, Centre ValBio, Madagacar Wildlife Conservation Alaotra Comic Book Project, and The Ako Book Project, are presented together with their ongoing stages of development, assessment, and outcomes. We argue that while nongovernmental organizational efforts are and will be very important, the Ministry of Education urgently needs to incorporate biodiversity education in the curriculum at all levels, from primary school to university. Am. J. Primatol. 72:391‐406, 2010. r 2009 Wiley-Liss, Inc.

Florent Ravoavy

Papers

Conservation education in Madagascar: three case studies in the biologically diverse island-continent.

RESEARCH ARTICLE Conservation Education in Madagascar: Three Case Studies in the Biologically Diverse Island-Continent