jrv – gbif science symposium 2013

Use of GBIF-mediated data for in-situ and ex-situ conservation planningJulian Ramirez-Villegas, Nora Castañeda, Colin Khoury, et al.

THE GBIF SCIENCE

SYMPOSIUM 2013

Berlin, October 8 2013

Wednesday, October 9, 13

Content

✤ Part 1: In-situ conservation of plant diversity in South America✤ GBIF mediated data✤ Threats and conservation status✤ Filling the conservation gaps

✤ Part 2: Ex-situ conservation of crop wild relatives✤ Methodology✤ GBIF data + + +✤ What and where to preserve

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Importance of biodiversity

✤ ~3 billion people depend directly on marine biodiversity + ~1.6 depend on forests (CBD, 2010)

✤ Pollinators are worth ~50 billion USD / year (CBD, 2010)

✤ Crop wild relatives valued in ~200 billion USD for agriculture

Biodiversity spots and poverty

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Importance of biodiversity

0

100

200

300

400

VEN COL PER ECU BOL E. Africa CWR Pollinators

GD

P /V

alue

(bill

ion

USD

)

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In-situ conservation of plant diversity in South America

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In-situ conservation of plant diversity in South America

GBIF data Threats data(Jarvis et al. 2010)

WDPA data

+ +

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GBIF data

✤ Automated cleansing of GBIF data

44,706,505

0

25

50

75

100

Plantae Coordinates Unique Trustable S. America

Per c

ent f

rom

Pla

ntae

33,340,000

14,390,414 12,860,281

513,368

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Existing threats

✤ We used a multi-dimensional “threat index”

endemism threat pop.

highest threat

lowest threat

Range size

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Existing threats

✤ ~80 % taxa have at least one population in a high threat area

✤ ~14 % taxa had 80 % or more of their populations at high threat

✤ 173 (out of 1088) taxa had their single recorded population in a high threat area

0

0.5

1

1.5

2 Average m

ax. threat among populations

AccessFires Def. Grass.Conv

Inf.Oil/Gas

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Are reserves sparse?

✤ For the most part they’re not:✤ >80 % taxa have at least one

population in a protected site✤ ... and 63 % have more than 30

% of their populations in protected sites

✤ But there are cases✤ ~18 % taxa presented no

populations in protected sites✤ How to improve the

representativeness?

Is it possible to widen the system?

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Messages

✤ Threat level seems to be high: accessibility, fires and deforestation being key drivers

✤ In some cases (e.g. taxa with little data) we may be over-estimating threats. Data collection remains key.

✤ Protected sites are in the right places, though better completeness can be achieved if a few areas are added to the current network

✤ ... and we must not forget about appropriate connectivity, monitoring and funding for protected sites

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Ex-situ conservation of crop wild relatives: gap analysis

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Why crop wild relatives?✤ Current crop breeders rely on finding the right genes

against biotic or abiotic stresses. Crop wild relatives may be such source:

Hajjar and Hodgkin (2007)Wednesday, October 9, 13

A gap analysis methodology... applied to 29 crops

Determine gapsModel

distributions

Gather taxonomic data

Gather occurrence data

Make conservation recommendations

Georeferencing

+others

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1. Taxonomic search

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2. Gather occurrence data

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3. Our data 2,608,155 records for the 29 crops1,526,698 records with coordinates

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4. Model species distributions

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5. A gap analysis methodology...

Taxonomic

EnvironmentalGeographic

Expert-based assessment of model results

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6. (a)What should we collect?

✤ Ex-situ conservation status

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6. (b) Where should we collect?

Sunflower

RiceBeans

MilletsCowpea Pigeonpea

Musa

Carrot

MaizeBeans

Apples

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“How well” our model does

Data paucity and lack of globally-informed expert caused large differences

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Delivering our results...

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Messages

✤ Crop wild relatives as a source of genetic traits for adapting to climate change

✤ Methodology published in 2010, now applied over 29 genepools --some 2 million data

✤ Nearly half CWR are not well conserved ex-situ. Collections are needed

✤ We can trust our approach reflects expert knowledge, though improvements in modelling are possible

✤ Collections need to happen in many countries in all continents... negotiations need to happen

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Conclusions

✤ Models and data can help design / improve conservation strategies, particularly if stresses and range changes are expected with climate change

✤ Thanks to GBIF data is being shared and... more importantly, widely used.

✤ Two example analyses show that the data is not perfect, but adequately represents (or complements) existing knowledge in many areas

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Thanks!j.r.villegas@cgiar.org

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