[PCA] Article: High proportion of cactus species threatened with extinction

[De Angelis, Patricia]

High proportion of cactus species threatened with extinction
Goettsch et a., 2015.
Nature Plants 1:15142

ABSTRACT (partial)

A high proportion of plant species is predicted to be threatened with
extinction in the near future. However, the threat status of only a small
number has been evaluated compared with key animal groups, rendering the
magnitude and nature of the risks plants face unclear. Here we report the
results of a global species assessment for the largest plant taxon
evaluated to date under the International Union for Conservation of Nature
(IUCN) Red List Categories and Criteria, the iconic Cactaceae (cacti). We
show that cacti are among the most threatened taxonomic groups assessed to
date, with 31% of the 1,478 evaluated species threatened, demonstrating the
high anthropogenic pressures on biodiversity in arid lands. The
distribution of threatened species and the predominant threatening
processes and drivers are different to those described for other taxa. The
most significant threat processes comprise land conversion to agriculture
and aquaculture, collection as biological resources, and residential and
commercial development. The dominant drivers of extinction risk are the
unscrupulous collection of live plants and seeds for horticultural trade
and private ornamental collections, smallholder livestock ranching and
smallholder annual agriculture. Our findings demonstrate that global
species assessments are readily achievable for major groups of plants with
relatively moderate resources, and highlight different conservation
priorities and actions to those derived from species assessments of key
animal groups.

Plants are of fundamental importance to much of the rest of biodiversity
and to many ecosystem functions, processes and services. However, the
global status of plant species, that is their likelihood of extinction in
the near future, remains poorly understood. Only 19,374 (6%) of an
estimated ∼300,000 species1 have been evaluated against the current IUCN
Red List Criteria2. Moreover, global species assessments, in which the
extinction risk of every extant species in a taxonomic group is
systematically assessed, have been conducted only for very few plant groups
(such as cycads, conifers, mangroves, sea grasses3,4,5) of which most are
not especially diverse.

Full article: http://www.nature.com/articles/nplants2015142
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