Mapping Indigenous land management for threatened species conservation: An Australian case-study

Much biodiversity lives on lands to which Indigenous people retain strong legal and management rights. However this is rarely quantified. Here we provide the first quantitative overview of the importance of Indigenous land for a critical and vulnerable part of biodiversity, threatened species, using...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2017-03, Vol.12 (3), p.e0173876-e0173876
Main Authors: Renwick, Anna R, Robinson, Catherine J, Garnett, Stephen T, Leiper, Ian, Possingham, Hugh P, Carwardine, Josie
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Analysis
Australia
Biodiversity
Biology and Life Sciences
Carbon
Case reports
Case studies
Climate change
Conservation
Conservation of Natural Resources
Conventions
Earth Sciences
Ecology and Environmental Sciences
Ecosystem
Ecosystems
Endangered & extinct species
Endangered Species
Environmental science
Indigenous peoples
Indigenous species
Land management
Land tenure
Land use planning
Legislation
Management
Native peoples
Native rights
People and Places
Protection and preservation
Social Sciences
Society
Terrestrial environments
Threatened species
Values
Wildlife conservation
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:Much biodiversity lives on lands to which Indigenous people retain strong legal and management rights. However this is rarely quantified. Here we provide the first quantitative overview of the importance of Indigenous land for a critical and vulnerable part of biodiversity, threatened species, using the continent of Australia as a case study. We find that three quarters of Australia's 272 terrestrial or freshwater vertebrate species listed as threatened under national legislation have projected ranges that overlap Indigenous lands. On average this overlap represents 45% of the range of each threatened species while Indigenous land is 52% of the country. Hotspots where multiple threatened species ranges overlap occur predominantly in coastal Northern Australia. Our analysis quantifies the vast potential of Indigenous land in Australia for contributing to national level conservation goals, and identifies the main land management arrangements available to Indigenous people which may enable them to deliver those goals should they choose to do so.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0173876