Redefining and mapping global irreplaceability

Irreplaceability is a concept used to describe how close a site is to being essential for achieving conservation targets. Current methods for measuring irreplaceability are based on representative combinations of sites, giving them an extrinsic nature and exponential computational requirements. Surrogate measures based on efficiency (complementarity) are often used as alternatives, but they were never intended for this purpose and do not measure irreplaceability. Current approaches used to estimate irreplaceability have key limitations. Some of these are a result of the tools used, but some are due to the nature of the current definition of irreplaceability. For irreplaceability to be stable and useful for conservation purposes and to resolve limitations, irreplaceability measures should adhere to five axioms; baseline coherence, monotonic responsiveness, proportional responsiveness, intrinsic stability, and bounded outputs. We designed a robust method for measuring a site's proximity to irreplaceability that adheres to these requirements and used it to develop the first systematic global map of irreplaceability based on data for terrestrial vertebrates (n = 29,837 species, >1 million grid cells). At least 3.5% of land surface was highly irreplaceable, and 47.6% of highly irreplaceable cells were contained in 12 countries. More generous thresholds of irreplaceability flag greater portions of land surface that would still be realistic to protect under current global objectives. Irreplaceable sites should form a critical component of any global conservation plan and should be part of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity's post2020 Global Biodiversity Framework strategy, forming part of the 30% protection by 2030 target that is gaining support. The reliable identification of irreplaceable sites will be crucial to halting extinctions.