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| The aim of continental and global identification of priority areas for
conservation is to identify particularly valuable areas for
conservation on which to focus more-detailed effort. Often, these sets
of important areas, referred to as priority sets, have been identified
through use of data on a single taxon (e.g., birds), which is assumed
to act as an indicator for all biodiversity. Using a database of the
distributions of 3882 vertebrate species in sub-Saharan Africa, we
conducted one of very few large-scale tests of this assumption. We used
six potential indicator groups-birds, mammals, amphibians, snakes,
threatened birds, and threatened mammals-to find priority sets of 200
areas that best represent the species in that group. Priority sets of
grid cells designed to maximize representation of a single indicator
group captured 83-93% of species in the other groups. This high degree
of representation is consistent with observed high levels of overlap in
the patterns of distribution of species in different groups. Those
species of highest conservation interest were more poorly represented,
however, with only 75-88% of other groups' threatened species and
63-76% of other groups' narrow-range species represented in the
priority sets. We conclude that existing priority sets based on
indicator groups provide a pragmatic basis for the immediate assessment
of priorities for conservation at a continental scale. However,
complete and efficient representation-especially of narrow-range
species-will not be achieved through indicator groups alone. Therefore,
priority-setting procedures must remain flexible so that new areas
important for other taxa can be incorporated as data become available. | |
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