Conservation Imperatives II: habitats in need of urgent action to prevent near-term extinctions

Asian-crested ibis, Nipponia nippon, also known as the Japanese crested ibis or Toki, photographed by Quan Min Li, via National Geographic.

Biodiversity is under significant human pressure and is declining faster now than at any point in human history. Approximately one million species are projected to face extinction, a figure that may itself be an underestimation. Compounding this crisis, nearly one-quarter of the world's land may face conversion by 2030. Conservation Imperatives Sites (Dinerstein et al. 2024) proposed priority areas for protection to safeguard rare and threatened species, spanning approximately 1% of global land areas. Given that resources, time, and capacity are limited, the new study aims to coordinate an urgent response from multilateral and bilateral donors, host-country governments, NGOs and foundations, and the private sector.

To prevent species extinctions, targeted action must focus on areas of threatened biodiversity facing intense human pressures. This objective is even more important in the run-up to 2030, the target date to conserve 30% of lands and waters globally. Conservation Imperatives (unprotected terrestrial sites that harbor rare, range-restricted, and threatened species) are critical to preventing imminent species losses. To prioritize amongst the 16,000+ Conservation Imperatives Sites (which span 1.64 million km2), this study ranks each site using a novel prioritization framework based on four criteria:

number of threatened species per site
irreplaceability of the site
proportion of an ecoregion’s remaining habitat contained
conversion pressure

The prioritization finds 1,667 sites totaling approximately 500,000 km2, which are deemed to be most in need of urgent protection. 87% of these sites occur in just 20 countries, spanning 250 ecoregions.

The proposed prioritization of Conservation Imperative sites addresses a growing concern among conservation biologists: that increased efforts to meet the 2030 deadline for protecting 30% of land and sea could lead to a focus on the quantity of land protected rather than quality, which requires knowledge of the most ecologically important sites. The new prioritization approach offers flexibility, allowing results to be filtered by ecoregion, country, biome, realm, or globally. It also examines how appropriate recognition of Indigenous and Traditional Territories (ITTs) could secure the protection of many Conservation Imperatives Sites in the near-term.

Lead scientist: Joe Gosling, UNEP-World Conservation Monitoring Centre

Contribution authors: Eric Dinerstein, Anup R. Joshi, Neil D. Burgess, Haley Mellin, Lucas Joppa, Heather C. Bingham, Osgur McDermott-Long, Jasmin Upton