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Walter V. Reid, Jeffrey A. McNeely, Daniel B. Tunstall, Dirk A. Bryant, and Manuel Winograd

Synopsis

Provides a framework for assessing biodiversity conditions and trends at local, national, regional, and global levels. It presents 22 indicators that can guide conservation decision-making.

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Biodiversity conservation has become increasingly important to government officials, conservationists, and even diplomats, thanks to the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in June 1992, and the new convention on biodiversity signed by over 150 countries. But the push for action to conserve biodiversity has outpaced the development of an analytical framework for monitoring its status and for establishing priorities.

This much-needed paper provides a framework for assessing biodiversity conditions and trends at local, national, regional, and global levels. It presents 22 indicators that can guide conservation decision-making by helping planners to set priorities, by influencing new policies, and by providing information to determine whether policy goals have been achieved. Organized into three categories, the indicators measure: wild species and genetic diversity; diversity at the community/habitat level; and diversity of domesticated species (crops and livestock).

This paper sets out a framework for assessing conditions and trends in biodiversity at local, national, regional, and global levels. The framework is used to identify a minimum set of indicators necessary to meet the needs of a diverse audience of policy-makers--those associated with international non-governmental organizations, intergovernmental organizations, and local governments, for example--each with differing perspectives on and approaches to biodiversity conservation. These indicators can guide conservation decision-making by helping planners to set priorities, by influencing new policies, and by providing information to determine whether policy goals have been achieved.

The paper begins by reviewing the role that indicators can play in conservation and follows with a discussion of the approaches to measuring biodiversity. These include outlining what needs to be measured and some of the problems faced in attempting to measure individual biodiversity attributes. A set of 22 indicators is organized into three categories:

• indicators used to measure wild species' and genetic diversity;
• indicators used to measure diversity at the community/habitat level; and
• indicators used to assess domesticated species (the diversity of crops and livestock).

The paper contains a review of the availability and the quality of the data needed to develop the indicators outlined in the text. It concludes with a discussion of how these indicators might be used for setting priorities for policy.

PDF Downloads

• Full text (14.4 Mb)
• Front matter (305 Kb)
• Chapter 1: Indicators and the conservation of biodiversity (380 Kb)
• Chapter 2: Measuring diversity (419 Kb)
• Chapter 3: Indicators of Biodiversity (1.8 Mb)
• Chapter 4: Data availability (950 Kb)
• Chapter 5: Using biodiversity indicarors to help set priorities (278 Kb)
• Appendix: Sources and technical notes for tables (419 Kb)
• References (419 Kb)