Saving the Small Apes: Conservation Assessment of Gibbon Species at the 2006 Asian Primate Red List Workshop

Abstract

The body of work assembled in this volume makes it clear that gibbons play an important ecological role in their environment, but unfortunately both gibbons and their habitats are in decline throughout their distribution range. Understanding the threats to wild populations is an important first step in conservation planning. In September 2006, several gibbon researchers were invited to participate in the Asian Primate Red List Workshop in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. Thomas Geissmann has prepared an excellent report of the results of this workshop as it pertains to gibbons (Geissmann 2007), and I will only summarize the overall conclusions of the workshop in this chapter. The researchers who assessed the status of gibbons at theWorkshop included Noviar Andayani, Bill Bleisch, Warren Y. Brockelman, Thomas Geissmann, Colin P. Groves, Nguyen Manh Ha, Saw Htun, Long Yongcheng, Eric Meijaard, Sanjay Molur, Vincent Nijman, Ben Rawson, Matt Richardson, Jatna Supriatna,Carl Traeholt, RobTimmins, JoeWalston,Danielle J.Whittaker, and Jiang Xuelong. The assessments resulting from the Workshop appear in the 2008 version of the IUCN Red List. TheWorldConservationUnion’sRedList of Threatened Species (IUCN2008) is a comprehensive review of threatened taxa across the globe. The categories for taxa that have been evaluated and forwhich sufficient data exist are, in increasing order of risk, Least Concern (LC), Near Threatened (NT), Vulnerable (VU), Endangered (EN), Critically Endangered (CE), Extinct in theWild (EW), and Extinct (EX). The criteria used to define each category include small or declining population size and small or declining geographic range; details and guidelines are described in the IUCN’s Red List Categories and Criteria (version 3.1: IUCN 2001). Sixteen purported species of gibbons were assessed at the workshop, three of which were divided into a total of 12 subspecies. The new status assessments for each taxon are summarized in Table 24.1, with the previous assessments (2003