TY - JOUR

T1 - High exposure of global tree diversity to human pressure

AU - Guo, Wen-Yong

AU - Serra-Diaz, Josep M.

AU - Schrodt, Franziska

AU - Eiserhardt, Wolf L.

AU - Maitner, Brian S.

AU - Merow, Cory

AU - Violle, Cyrille

AU - Anand, Madhur

AU - Belluau, Michaël

AU - Bruun, Hans Henrik

AU - Byun, Chaeho

AU - Catford, Jane A.

AU - Cerabolini, Bruno E. L.

AU - Chacón-Madrigal, Eduardo

AU - Ciccarelli, Daniela

AU - Cornelissen, J. Hans C.

AU - Dang-Le, Anh Tuan

AU - de Frutos, Angel

AU - Dias, Arildo S.

AU - Giroldo, Aelton B.

AU - Guo, Kun

AU - Gutiérrez, Alvaro G.

AU - Hattingh, Wesley

AU - He, Tianhua

AU - Hietz, Peter

AU - Hough-Snee, Nate

AU - Jansen, Steven

AU - Kattge, Jens

AU - Klein, Tamir

AU - Komac, Benjamin

AU - Kraft, Nathan J. B.

AU - Kramer, Koen

AU - Lavorel, Sandra

AU - Lusk, Christopher H.

AU - Martin, Adam R.

AU - Mencuccini, Maurizio

AU - Michaletz, Sean T.

AU - Minden, Vanessa

AU - Mori, Akira S.

AU - Niinemets, Ülo

AU - Onoda, Yusuke

AU - Peñuelas, Josep

AU - Pillar, Valério D.

AU - Pisek, Jan

AU - Robroek, Bjorn J. M.

AU - Schamp, Brandon

AU - Slot, Martijn

AU - Sosinski, Ênio Egon

AU - Soudzilovskaia, Nadejda A.

AU - Thiffault, Nelson

AU - van Bodegom, Peter

AU - van der Plas, Fons

AU - Wright, Ian J.

AU - Xu, Wu-Bing

AU - Zheng, Jingming

AU - Enquist, Brian J.

AU - Svenning, Jens-Christian

N1 - Publisher Copyright: Copyright © 2022 the Author(s).

PY - 2022

Y1 - 2022

N2 - Safeguarding Earth’s tree diversity is a conservation priority due to the importance of trees for biodiversity and ecosystem functions and services such as carbon sequestration. Here, we improve the foundation for effective conservation of global tree diversity by analyzing a recently developed database of tree species covering 46,752 species. We quantify range protection and anthropogenic pressures for each species and develop conservation priorities across taxonomic, phylogenetic, and functional diversity dimensions. We also assess the effectiveness of several influential proposed conservation prioritization frameworks to protect the top 17% and top 50% of tree priority areas. We find that an average of 50.2% of a tree species’ range occurs in 110-km grid cells without any protected areas (PAs), with 6,377 small-range tree species fully unprotected, and that 83% of tree species experience nonnegligible human pressure across their range on average. Protecting high-priority areas for the top 17% and 50% priority thresholds would increase the average protected proportion of each tree species’ range to 65.5% and 82.6%, respectively, leaving many fewer species (2,151 and 2,010) completely unprotected. The priority areas identified for trees match well to the Global 200 Ecoregions framework, revealing that priority areas for trees would in large part also optimize protection for terrestrial biodiversity overall. Based on range estimates for >46,000 tree species, our findings show that a large proportion of tree species receive limited protection by current PAs and are under substantial human pressure. Improved protection of biodiversity overall would also strongly benefit global tree diversity.

AB - Safeguarding Earth’s tree diversity is a conservation priority due to the importance of trees for biodiversity and ecosystem functions and services such as carbon sequestration. Here, we improve the foundation for effective conservation of global tree diversity by analyzing a recently developed database of tree species covering 46,752 species. We quantify range protection and anthropogenic pressures for each species and develop conservation priorities across taxonomic, phylogenetic, and functional diversity dimensions. We also assess the effectiveness of several influential proposed conservation prioritization frameworks to protect the top 17% and top 50% of tree priority areas. We find that an average of 50.2% of a tree species’ range occurs in 110-km grid cells without any protected areas (PAs), with 6,377 small-range tree species fully unprotected, and that 83% of tree species experience nonnegligible human pressure across their range on average. Protecting high-priority areas for the top 17% and 50% priority thresholds would increase the average protected proportion of each tree species’ range to 65.5% and 82.6%, respectively, leaving many fewer species (2,151 and 2,010) completely unprotected. The priority areas identified for trees match well to the Global 200 Ecoregions framework, revealing that priority areas for trees would in large part also optimize protection for terrestrial biodiversity overall. Based on range estimates for >46,000 tree species, our findings show that a large proportion of tree species receive limited protection by current PAs and are under substantial human pressure. Improved protection of biodiversity overall would also strongly benefit global tree diversity.

KW - biodiversity

KW - conservation frameworks

KW - land use

KW - protected areas

KW - tree species

U2 - 10.1073/pnas.2026733119

DO - 10.1073/pnas.2026733119

M3 - Journal article

C2 - 35709320

AN - SCOPUS:85132082850

VL - 119

JO - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

JF - Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America

SN - 0027-8424

IS - 25

M1 - e2026733119

ER -