Gap analyses of priority wild relatives of food crop in current ex situ and in situ conservation in Indonesia

Wiguna Rahman,Aremi R Contreras-Toledo,Mariam Faraji,Joana Magos Brehm,Nigel Maxted,Mauricio Parra Quijano,Jade Phillips

doi:10.1007/s10531-021-02225-4

Abstract

Conservation programmes are always limited by available resources. Careful planning is therefore required to increase the efficiency of conservation and gap analysis can be used for this purpose. This method was used to assess the representativeness of current ex situ and in situ conservation actions of 234 priority crop wild relatives (CWR) in Indonesia. This analysis also included species distribution modelling, the creation of an ecogeographical land characterization map, and a complementarity analysis to identify priorities area for in situ conservation and for further collecting of ex situ conservation programmes. The results show that both current ex situ and in situ conservation actions are insufficient. Sixty-six percent of priority CWRs have no recorded ex situ collections. Eighty CWRs with ex situ collections are still under-represented in the national genebanks and 65 CWRs have no presence records within the existing protected area network although 60 are predicted to exist in several protected areas according to their potential distribution models. The complementarity analysis shows that a minimum of 61 complementary grid areas (complementary based on grid cells) are required to conserve all priority taxa and 40 complementary protected areas (complementary based on existing protected areas) are required to conserve those with known populations within the existing in situ protected area network. The top ten of complementary protected areas are proposed as the initial areas for the development of CWR genetic reserves network in Indonesia. It is recommended to enhanced coordination between ex situ and in situ conservation stakeholders for sustaining the long term conservation of CWR in Indonesia. Implementation of the research recommendations will provide for the first time an effective conservation planning of Indonesia’s CWR diversity and will significantly enhance the country’s food and nutritional security.

Highlights

The Second Report on the State of the World’s Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture asserted that the use of crop wild relatives (CWR) in crop improvement programmes was increasing (FAO 2010)
The results proposed here report on the representativeness of these national priority CWR in current ex situ and in situ conservation programmes in Indonesia
Even though complementary protected areas may not conserve all genetic diversity of priority taxa, these results provide baseline information for a minimum set of priority conservation areas, extend the coverage of existing PA, and/or make informal in situ conservation areas

Summary

Introduction

The Second Report on the State of the World’s Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture asserted that the use of CWR in crop improvement programmes was increasing (FAO 2010). In situ conservation programmes are only just getting global attention as a useful method for conserving CWR (Maxted 2003; Meilleur and Hodgkin 2004; Maxted and Kell 2009; Hunter and Heywood 2010; Bellon and Burdon 2017) This approach ensures the continued evolutionary adaptation of CWR to environmental changes and continuing to shape their genetic diversity (Maxted et al 2008a, b; Bellon and Burdon 2017). Vincent et al (2019) showed that most of globally priority CWR are underrepresented in the global protected areas network

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