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Updated: May 28, 2026
13:18
Data Collection on Marine Litter Ingestion in Sea Turtles and Thresholds for Good Environmental Status
Published on: May 18, 2019
Global conservation priorities for marine turtles.
Bryan P Wallace1, Andrew D DiMatteo, Alan B Bolten
1IUCN/SSC Marine Turtle Specialist Group, Arlington, Virginia, United States of America. b.wallace@conservation.org
Plos One
|October 5, 2011
Summary
A new framework prioritizes marine turtle conservation by assessing Regional Management Units (RMUs). It identifies the 11 most endangered RMUs, guiding global conservation efforts and highlighting data gaps for these widespread species.
Area of Science:
- Marine Biology
- Conservation Science
- Ecology
Background:
- Limited conservation resources necessitate robust frameworks for prioritizing actions, especially for widespread species with diverse threats.
- Marine turtles are globally distributed with distinct populations (Regional Management Units - RMUs) facing varied threats and population trends.
- Existing extinction risk assessments do not adequately address the distinct status of individual marine turtle RMUs.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop and implement a novel assessment framework for evaluating and prioritizing marine turtle Regional Management Units (RMUs) globally.
- To create a "conservation priorities portfolio" system categorizing RMUs by paired risk and threat scores.
- To identify patterns in risk, threats, and data gaps across different scales (global, species, ocean basin, geopolitical).
Main Methods:
- Developed a new assessment framework to evaluate, compare, and organize 58 marine turtle RMUs based on status and threats.
- Created a "conservation priorities portfolio" system using paired risk and threat scores.
- Performed global, species-specific, ocean basin, and geopolitical assessments and rankings.
Main Results:
- Characterized the risk and threats for all 58 marine turtle RMUs.
- Identified the world's 11 most endangered marine turtle RMUs based on highest risk and threat scores.
- Highlighted significant data gaps crucial for accurate conservation assessments.
Conclusions:
- The developed framework provides guidance for research and conservation priorities at multiple scales for marine turtles.
- This system serves as a model for conservation status assessments and priority-setting for other widespread, long-lived taxa.
- Effective conservation requires addressing distinct population statuses and varying threat impacts across RMUs.
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