Abstract
Red Listing of Threatened species is recognized as the most objective approach for evaluating extinction risk of living organisms which can be applied at global or national scales. Invertebrates account for nearly 97% of all animals on the planet but are insufficiently represented in the IUCN Red Lists at both scales. To analyze the occurrence of species present in regional Red Lists, accounts of 48 different countries and regions all over the world were consulted and all data about myriapods (Myriapoda) ever assessed in Red Lists at any level assembled. Myriapod species assessments were found in eleven regional Red Lists; however, no overlap between the species included in the global IUCN Red List and the regional ones was established. This means that myriapod species considered threatened at regional level may not be eligible for international funding specific for protection of native threatened species (more than US$ 25 million were available in the last decade) as most financial instruments tend to support only threatened species included in the IUCN Red List. As the lack of financial resources may limit protection for species in risk of extinction, it is urgent to increase the possibilities of getting financial support for implementation of measures for their protection. A Red List of all Myriapoda species recorded in Red Lists at national or local (596) and global (210) scales totaling 806 species is presented. This list shows for the first time an overview of the current conservation status of Myriapoda species. Here, the urgent need of establishing a Myriapoda Specialist Group in the Species Survival Commission of IUCN is also stressed.
Highlights
Biodiversity conservation is an applied science which involves several tools and approaches to avoid species extinction and protect environment as a whole
We analyzed: a) which species from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List were present in regional Red Lists; b) which species are represented in more than one Regional Red List; c) the proportion of each extinction risk category; d) correlations between: growth in GDP (World Bank 2019), protected areas network coverage (World Bank 2019), deforestation rate (Mongabay 2019), CO2 emission rates (World Bank 2019) for each country included as well as the proportion of threatened species recorded for that country; e) which species are endemic; we considered endemic a species occurring only in the country where it is listed
It considers both the species present in regional Red Lists and in the IUCN Global Red List, and totals 806 species belonging to the four Myriapoda classes: Diplopoda (81%), Chilopoda (16%), Pauropoda (2%), and Symphyla (1%)
Summary
Biodiversity conservation is an applied science which involves several tools and approaches to avoid species extinction and protect environment as a whole. The approaches for conservation planning may vary in scale and extent (Pressey and Bottrill 2009), but they need to rely on rigorous evidence on species and ecosystems involved (Cook et al 2010). Evidence-based wildlife management requires reliable information on the conservation status and the extinction risk of species (Charra and Sarasa 2018). The most widely recognized assessment of the conservation status of species is the Red List of Threatened Species, established by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) in 1964 (Charra and Sarasa 2018). The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species plays an important role of a global database of the conservation status of various organism groups (IUCN 2019a)
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