Where to improve the European protected areas network to represent threatened fungi?

To set a global example in biodiversity conservation, the European Union aims to protect 30% and strictly protect 10% of its land by 2030 and to invest in ecosystem restoration. Yet, the megadiverse fungal kingdom remains largely excluded from conservation planning and evaluation. We compiled occurrence data and developed species distribution models for 33 threatened macrofungi identified for potential inclusion under the Bern Convention across Europe. Comparing distributions of predicted habitats with existing protected-area networks provided robust evidence of large, uneven protection gaps among species and countries. We show that regionally coordinated improvements in protection and targeted habitat restoration would be more effective than addressing gaps independently within each country. By developing habitat models into tools for conservation management, spatial planning and monitoring, and by explicitly allocating those efforts across Member States, protection of neglected but threatened and functionally important taxa such as fungi can be systematically improved.