The future-focused Proactive Conservation Index highlights unrecognized global priorities for vertebrate conservation

Area of Science:

• Biodiversity conservation
• Conservation science
• Environmental science

Background:

• Human activities intensify environmental pressures globally.
• Future-focused tools are crucial for effective biodiversity conservation planning.
• Existing conservation approaches need supplementation to address future threats.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop a continuous conservation prioritization index, the Proactive Conservation Index (PCI).
• To integrate projected future extrinsic threats and species vulnerability traits into a single index.
• To assess and compare future conservation priorities for land vertebrates globally.

Main Methods:

• Developed the Proactive Conservation Index (PCI) integrating future threats and species vulnerability.
• Assessed conservation priority for 33,560 land vertebrate species worldwide.
• Compared PCI results with IUCN Red List categories and analyzed spatial/phylogenetic patterns.

Main Results:

• PCI scores generally aligned with IUCN Red List but showed significant within-category variation.
• Reptiles identified as the highest future conservation priority group, surpassing amphibians.
• Near Threatened species showed future conservation needs similar to threatened categories.
• Arid ecoregions, tropical montane forests, and islands revealed discrepancies between PCI and IUCN priorities.
• PCI highlighted unprotected ecoregions with vulnerable fauna facing future threats.

Conclusions:

• The PCI offers a novel approach to prioritize species conservation under future global change scenarios.
• The index identifies unrecognized future conservation needs in specific ecoregions.
• PCI-based prioritization can guide fine-scale conservation actions in unprotected areas.
• Developed a web application and R package for user-friendly PCI calculation and application.