131 - Ensuring adequate funding for the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species

131 - Ensuring adequate funding for the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species

Latest version in this language: Version as sent to Plenary | Published on: 01 Oct 2021

RECALLING that the importance of the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (Red List) has been emphasised by Members several times (e.g. Resolutions 3.013 The uses of the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (Bangkok, 2004), 4.018 Increased participation of scientists from relevant countries in the preparation of the IUCN Red List (Barcelona, 2008), 5.017 Enhancing the usefulness of the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species (Jeju, 2012) and 6.016 The IUCN Red List Index for monitoring extinction risk (Hawai‘i, 2016));

NOTING that Red List data are of critical importance in monitoring the achievement of biodiversity outcomes, including those set by the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs);

ANTICIPATING that the Red List will play a critical role in monitoring and guiding the implementation of the post-2020 global biodiversity framework;

FURTHER NOTING the wide use and application of the Red List for conservation planning and management, including by donors to help guide resource allocation and financial institutions to ensure investments do not jeopardise the survival of threatened species;

THANKFUL to the members of the Species Survival Commission (SSC) who give their time voluntarily by contributing to the Red List;

GRATEFUL to the 13 Red List Partner organisations for their extensive contributions to the Red List both in cash and in kind;

ESPECIALLY GRATEFUL to the staff of the IUCN Red List Unit (RLU) for their meticulous work in processing Red List assessments, maintaining the database and website, and in quality assurance;

AWARE that annual submissions of assessments to the RLU are increasing;

WELCOMING the new Red List Strategic Plan (RLSP) which aims to add 129,000 assessments and 137,000 reassessments by 2030;

CONCERNED that staffing reductions in the RLU in 2021 by one-third due to funding shortfalls are causing a backlog of assessments in the submission queue;

EMPHASISING that delays in the publication of assessments mean that relevant authorities may be unaware that particular places and species need urgent conservation attention, thus delaying conservation actions and the prevention of damaging developments; and

STRESSING, moreover, that backlogs could undermine donor confidence in the Red List and hinder other initiatives, such as identification of Key Biodiversity Areas (KBAs);

The IUCN World Conservation Congress, at its session in Marseille, France:

1. REQUESTS the IUCN Patrons of Nature and the Chair of the Species Survival Commission (SSC) to collaborate closely with the Director General on fundraising for the Red List;

2. CALLS ON donors, especially those that are IUCN Members, including State Members, to respond generously to the Director General’s fundraising initiative for the Red List;

3. ENCOURAGES donors, in addition to ensuring the stability and viability of the RLU, to help ensure that funding is available to support the work of the Species Survival Commission and Red List Partners in delivering the RLSP, noting that funding has hitherto proven hard to raise for the reassessment of species, and yet reassessments are essential to track changes in status over time through the IUCN Red List Index; and

4. FURTHER REQUESTS the Director General to ensure, within available resources, that the RLU has the capacity to process species assessments in English, French, Portuguese and Spanish.

The RLTS is the world’s most comprehensive source of information on the status of species. It is used by national/local governments, conservation organizations, businesses, research and educational institutions to guide policy decisions, inform conservation planning, influence funding allocation, and educate and build awareness. RLTS data is drawn on to revise the appendices of CITES and CMS, and to measure progress towards achieving the UN SDGs, particularly Goal 15, and the CBD targets.

Many donors rely on the RLTS to make informed decisions (e.g., GEF, CEPF, SOS, USFWS, and MBZ Species Conservation Fund) and many environmental safeguard standards explicitly refer to it. Conservation planning methodologies such as KBAs depend on RLTS data to prioritise important areas. The regular RLTS updates generate significant media interest and provide tangible evidence of the plight of species and broader environmental issues.

The RLTS includes assessments of >134,400 species, of which 37,400 are globally threatened. The RL Strategic Plan focuses on taxonomic and geographic expansion, with the aim of adding ~130,000 new assessments and reassessing ~137,000 species. Thousands of SSC members and the 13 RL partner organizations work towards this goal and the number of assessments submitted to the RLU continues to increase annually. However, for this goal to be achieved, greater capacity within the RLU is needed to process assessments and maintain the high standards that are essential for reliability and credibility of the data.

The RLTS expansion has coincided with a very recent reduction in RLU staffing, from 9 to 6, because of funding shortfalls. The RLU is largely project funded, with no sustainable source of income. In mid-August 2021, 8,431 assessments were awaiting processing by the RLU, estimated to increase to >10,000 by September 2021 (the submission deadline for the December update). For the previous RLTS update, 4,600 assessments were processed by the reduced number of staff (before recent staffing reductions, about 6,700 were processed for each update); so almost half of the assessments submitted for the December 2021 update will likely not be processed. In the current backlog are 1,185 assessments in Portuguese or Spanish, but the RLU has lost its capacity to process these.

This is the first time that thousands of assessments will not be published on the RLTS due to lack of capacity within the RLU; the staffing reduction has developed into a new crisis that needs to be immediately addressed before the situation worsens. The motion sponsors were unaware of this situation until the RLU communicated that many thousands of species would not be published in the upcoming update.

The consequences of thousands of assessments not being included on the RLTS will be severe. Urgent conservation action will be delayed, other initiatives (such as KBA identification) will be impacted, conservation-related and development decisions will rely on increasingly more out of date information, and the reputation of IUCN is at risk if it is not able to maintain the RLTS as a reliable and credible source of information on the global conservation status of species.
  • A ROCHA GHANA [Ghana]
  • A Rocha International [United Kingdom]
  • American Society of Mammalogists [United States of America]
  • Center for Biodiversity Outcomes, Arizona State University [United States of America]
  • Conservation International [United States of America]
  • Endangered Wildlife Trust [South Africa]
  • Istituto Superiore per la Protezione e la Ricerca Ambientale [Italy]
  • NatureServe [United States of America]
  • New Mexico BioPark Society [United States of America]
  • PROVITA [Venezuela]
  • Rainforest Trust [United States of America]
  • Re:wild [United States of America]
  • Wildlife Trust of India [India]
  • World Wide Fund for Nature - International [Switzerland]
  • WWF - Deutschland [Germany]

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