International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources

About: International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources is a nonprofit organization based out in Dhaka, Bangladesh. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Biodiversity & Population. The organization has 1317 authors who have published 1870 publications receiving 97588 citations.

The MPA Guide: A framework to achieve global goals for the ocean

Abstract: Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) are conservation tools intended to protect biodiversity, promote healthy and resilient marine ecosystems, and provide societal benefits. Despite codification of MPAs i...

Global diversity patterns and cross-taxa convergence in freshwater systems.

Abstract: Whereas global patterns and predictors of species diversity are well known for numerous terrestrial taxa, our understanding of freshwater diversity patterns and their predictors is much more limited. Here, we examine spatial concordance in global diversity patterns for five freshwater taxa (i.e. aquatic mammals, aquatic birds, fishes, crayfish and aquatic amphibians) and investigate the environmental factors driving these patterns at the river drainage basin grain. We find that species richness and endemism patterns are significantly correlated among taxa. We also show that cross-taxon congruence patterns are often induced by common responses of taxa to their contemporary and historical environments (i.e. convergent patterns). Apart from some taxa distinctiveness (i.e. fishes), the ‘climate/productivity’ hypothesis is found to explain the greatest variance in species richness and endemism patterns, followed by factors related to the ‘history/dispersion’ and ‘area/environmental heterogeneity’ hypotheses. As aquatic amphibians display the highest levels of congruency with other taxa, this taxon appears to be a good ‘surrogate’ candidate for developing global freshwater conservation planning at the river drainage basin grain.

Sustaining Natural and Human Capital: Villagers and Scientists

Abstract: Community-based natural resource management (CBNRM) is a rural development paradigm that combines biological conservation and sustainable use of natural resources. In southern Africa, CBNRM has contributed to the wellbeing of human communities and to the conservation of elephants and other threatened species. Success in this arena requires the establishment of a respectful partnership between villagers and scientists that draws upon their complementary knowledge and skills.

An evaluation of the robustness of global amphibian range maps

Abstract: Aim Maps of species ranges are among the most frequently used distribution data in biodiversity studies. As with any biological data, range maps have some level of measurement error, but this error is rarely quantified. We assessed the error associated with amphibian range maps by comparing them with point locality data. Location Global. Methods The maps published by the Global Amphibian Assessment were assessed against two data sets of species point localities: the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), and a refined data set including recently published, high-quality presence data from both GBIF and other sources. Range fit was measured as the proportion of presence records falling within the range polygon(s) for each species. Results Using the high-quality point data provided better fit measures than using the raw GBIF data. Range fit was highly variable among continents, being highest for North American and European species (a fit of 84–94%), and lowest for Asian and South American species (a fit of 57–64%). At the global scale, 95% of amphibian point records were inside the ranges published in maps, or within 31 km of the range edge. However, differences among continents were striking, and more points were found far from range edges for South American and Asian species. Main conclusions The Global Amphibian Assessment range maps represent the known distribution of most amphibians well; this study provides measures of accuracy that can be useful for future research using amphibian maps as baseline data. Nevertheless, there is a need for greater investment in the continuous updating and improvement of maps, particularly in the megadiverse areas of tropical Asia and South America.

Forgotten Biodiversity in Desert Ecosystems

Abstract: As the world's governments congregate for the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (Rio+20), we call on them to address one of the greatest oversights in conservation in recent years: the neglect of desert ecosystems. Deserts cover 17% of the world's land mass and harbor surprisingly