IUCN Red List Program Bio-indicators Workshop

Arizona State University, Scottsdale AZ

Investigators

Abstract

This workshop will bring together US and foreign researchers to develop and enhance methodology to expand the role of the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species as tool for monitoring trends in biodiversity. The International Union of Conservation of Nature's Red List is widely recognized as the most comprehensive, apolitical global system to evaluate the conservation status of plant and animal species. To enable the Red List to function as an indicator of the state of biodiversity, the state of species, and the state of ecosystems, two major changes are required. The first is much better documentation of each species entry in the list, in particular, whether its population is increasing, decreasing, or stable. The second change is agreement on the core taxonomic coverage of the Red List. This needs to include groups that are broadly representative of the major ecosystems of the world, that are taxonomically tractable, that are reasonably well-known, and for which expertise networks exist or could be developed. The outcome of this workshop will be to develop indices from Red List criteria that will provide a valuable tool for biodiversity planners and to serve as the basis for strategic development of the Red-list program.