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3.1. Biodiversity Conservation

It is crucial to have detailed information about biodiversity in order to evaluate species /
populations / sub-species conservation statutes, which indicates if this biodiversity group still
exists and the probability of this group becoming extinct in a near future.

The major information’s for this evaluation is the information’s about specie distribution and
abundance. Overall Conservation Statues Systems evaluate conservation statues at the specie
level.

Counting and mapping animals, fungus and plants are very challenging tasks, firstly because they
occur in a very large area, including in inhabitant areas (deserts, tropical rainforests, etc) or difficult
access areas (ocean depth, mountains, caves, etc).

The International Union for Conservation Nature (IUCN) was established in 1948, and later in 1964,
IUCN developed one of the most comprehensive information sources about species conservation
statues worldwide – IUCN Red List.

The IUCN Red List provides information about the global extinction risk status of animal, fungus
and plant species. Extinction is a process by which a specie can disappear from planet earth.
Several factors can contribute as we all seen for species extinction, and normally is not a sudden
process, at the human time scale, meaning that we can anticipate its happening and propose
measures to prevent such extinction.

Five criteria area evaluated in order to establish specie conservation statue:
A. Population size reduction (past, present and/or projected)
B. Geographic range size, and fragmentation, few locations, decline or fluctuations
C. Small and declining population size and fragmentation, fluctuations, or few subpopulations
D. Very small population or very restricted distribution
E. Quantitative analysis of extinction risk (e.g., Population Viability Analysis)

IUCN BIG DATA

Species assessed: 142 577.
Species threatened with extinction: 40 000 (28% of all assessed species).

This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This communication reflects the
views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the

information contained therein.