Hotspots revisited: Earth's biologically richest and most endangered terrestrial ecoregions PDF

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H O T S P O T S R E V I S I T E D SERIES PRODUCER CEMEX BOOKS ON NATURE PATRICIO ROBLES GIL RUSSELL A. MITTERMEIER PATRICIO ROBLES GIL MICHAEL HOFFMANN JOHN PILGRIM THOMAS BROOKS CRISTINA GOETTSCH MITTERMEIER JOHN LAMOREUX GUSTAVO A.B. DA FONSECA PREFACE PETER A. SELIGMANN FOREWORD HARRISON FORD CE...

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Hotspots revisited: Earth's biologically richest and most endangered terrestrial ecoregions Thomas Brooks

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SERIES PRODUCER CEMEX BOOKS ON NATURE

PATRICIO ROBLES GIL RUSSELL A. MITTERMEIER PATRICIO ROBLES GIL MICHAEL HOFFMANN JOHN PILGRIM THOMAS BROOKS CRISTINA GOETTSCH MITTERMEIER JOHN LAMOREUX GUSTAVO A.B. DA FONSECA PREFACE

PETER A. SELIGMANN FOREWORD

HARRISON FORD

CEMEX 2004

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In recent years, thanks to the efforts made by CEMEX and other organizations that share with us the commitment to promote biodiversity protection, it has been possible to define new, innovative environmental strategies and policies for curbing the deterioration of hotspots, Earth’s most endangered terrestrial ecoregions. The hotspots concept was developed in 1988 by British ecologist Norman Myers; since then, it has been supported by organizations such as Conservation International. The dissemination and impact of this concept were widened in 1999, with the presentation of our book Hotspots. Earth’s Biologically Richest and Most Endangered Terrestrial Ecoregions, the second volume in a series of works published jointly with Conservation International and Agrupación Sierra Madre. The scientific information gathered to date has made it possible to identify new areas of great ecological importance to be included within the hotspots classification, as well as to obtain relevant data on zones that had originally formed part of this category. Thus, we have been able to make progress in what definitely should be considered a global priority: the conservation of biotic resources. In the diversity of lifeforms we find the very possibility of maintaining the wide range of alternatives for achieving sustainable development. Convinced that the goal of ensuring a living planet requires a foresighted strategy along with collective, coordinated efforts, at CEMEX we are very proud to work once again with Conservation International and Agrupación Sierra Madre, presenting this new book, Hotspots Revisited. On the pages of this volume, you will find clearly stated the ways and spaces in which we should focus our attention and resources in order to achieve the survival of the greatest possible number of species and ecosystems. Included among the new terrestrial ecoregions considered as hotspots is the Sierra Madre Oriental and Occidental of Mexico. Located there is El Carmen, a project of wide scope that CEMEX has promoted for five years now for the purpose of having a direct bearing on its conservation. We hope that the enhancement of the hotspots concept and the strategies proposed in this new book will contribute towards thinking on a world scale and acting on a local one so as to successfully meet the challenge posed by biodiversity conservation. As a worldwide enterprise fully committed to promoting sustainable development, at CEMEX we are confident that the resources devoted today to this goal will entail the best possible investment for ensuring the permanence of biodiversity on our planet. CEMEX 7

The Garden of Eden was green, lush, and rich in wildlife, and a sanctuary where humankind and nature lived in harmony. Sadly, this image is no longer a reality for those unique places which harbor the majority of life on Earth. We share our world with at least five million species of animals and plants, and perhaps as many as 30 million. This biodiversity is our most precious resource —our living heritage. All cultures revere this diversity in one way or another, through music, art, literature or tourism. All religions charge humanity with caring for life on Earth. Biodiversity is what distinguishes our planet from the rest of the universe; indeed, it defines us. Biodiversity is unique and irreplaceable. Around the world, however, greed and poverty conspire to extinguish this variety of life. Overconsumption is the most grievous of these insults. Our world’s forests and other natural habitats are being decimated to feed the lust of the so-called “developed” world for timber, minerals, exotic pets, luxury foods. Meanwhile, unjust distribution of wealth forces billions of people in the “developing” world to depend on exploiting the remaining scraps of nature. They hunt the last wildlife and clear the last habitats for marginal agriculture. As the world becomes more tightly interconnected, the threat of invasive species becomes ever more potent. Such exotics are the death knell for those species that have evolved without such predators or competitors. Cataclysmic global warming looms on the horizon. Neither the places where species live nor the threats that we impose on them are uniform around the planet. Those places holding the greatest concentrations of biodiversity also face some of the most intense pressures. More than half of the world’s plant species and more than a third of Earth’s mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians are found in just 2.3% of its land surface. Most of these areas are tropical, like the Atlantic Forest, the Caribbean, Madagascar, Sundaland, the Philippines, and the Tropical Andes. They are called the biodiversity hotspots. No matter how successful conservation activities are elsewhere on the planet, unless threats are reduced in these soon, we will lose at least half of Earth’s diversity of life. These biodiversity hotspots hold some of the highest human population densities on the planet and some of its poorest people. Their poverty is a direct result of the destruction of forests, erosion of soils, pollution of rivers, and overharvesting of wildlife. Some environmental destruction is fatal. For example, deforestation often causes disastrous flooding, but also the emergence of infectious diseases. Most of the world’s bloodiest wars are unleashed in the hotspots, too, often driven by resource conflicts. Somalia, Afghanistan, Palestine, northern Iraq, Timor, Haiti: all lie in hotspots harboring exceptional numbers of plant species found nowhere else.

Thoughtless exploitation of the Earth’s plenty has destroyed the Garden of Eden. Human actions have exterminated the harmony of nature and depleted the gifts of clean water, productive soils, clean air, and the abundance of life-forms required for people to lead healthy lives. The challenge which Conservation International has accepted is to work in these hotspots to prevent irreversible loss of biodiversity and to eradicate absolute poverty. Fortunately, many of the solutions to these two problems coincide. The highest priority is maintenance of the remaining natural vegetation cover in the hotspots. This provides habitat for biodiversity and ecosystem services like clean water for people. In the longer term, it will be necessary to restore the natural habitats across much of the hotspots. Meanwhile, reduction to sustainable levels of the harvesting of natural food, fiber, and fuel will be essential if these resources are to persist. Of course, these solutions will not come for free. Protection, restoration, and sustainable use of the natural ecosystems of the hotspots will impose short-term costs on those least able to afford them. They will only be possible, therefore, with a dramatic increase of resources flowing from the “developed” countries to the hotspots of the “developing” world. But these resources are far from unaffordable for the former. Over the next 10 years, an investment of $100 billion is needed in these priority hotspots. By comparison, the war in Iraq 2003-2004 has so far cost the United States $168 billion in military spending alone. Among the most important ways to meet this challenge is through partnerships at many different levels, including the private sector. In this regard, we are particularly pleased with our long-term relationship with CEMEX. Their efforts to reduce their industry’s environmental footprint and their support for biodiversity conservation in Mexico have demonstrated their commitment and leadership, and their support for this outstanding series of books, now in its twelfth year, has had a major impact around the world. The hotspots concept was first developed in 1988 by the ecologist Norman Myers. Now, 16 years later, and after several revisions and updated analyses, it has emerged as the dominant paradigm for global conservation strategy. As we enter this new millennium, the time has come for the world to recognize that the geography and solutions of global poverty align closely with those of the biodiversity hotspots. Only by tackling these two agendas together will we truly be able to end poverty and conserve life on Earth. PETER A. SELIGMANN Chairman of the Board and CEO Conservation International

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“I’m not a biologist, nor an expert on global strategies to safeguard threatened species and vanishing habitats. But I am deeply concerned about the future of our planet,” Harrison Ford tells us in the Foreword of this book. This concern is shared by many of us who fight for the permanence of life on Earth and are united in a search for solutions. Yet usually we comprise a concert of voices that does not manage to be heard due to the tremendous complexity of the world in which we live. Thus, we need a single voice, such as that of Harrison Ford, so that we may be heard. Among the different priorities set on an international level, the conservation movement is like the “new kid in the neighborhood,” whose popularity is growing, but who is far from gaining the attention he needs. This movement has to compete for resources allocated to needs deemed to be the most pressing for humankind: food, health, education, religion. Nevertheless, nature has always been closely linked to traditional human preoccupations. Nature, or rediscovering it, now defines many religions in the world, and has constituted a major theme for our artistic and cultural expressions. Lastly, no one can question the fact that meeting our basic needs in terms of health and food depends on whether or not our natural environment remains sound. This book provides us with a clear strategy for conserving biodiversity, and indicates a line of action to be followed, but society as a whole is who utilizes natural resources and who can promote and achieve a change in the way these are consumed. And society is also the one to determine the need for maintaining the diversity of life on this planet and the extraordinary variety of opportunities it affords. If we want biodiversity conservation to be adopted as one of the most important social priorities, we must organize and carry out an intense campaign to “sell it” as an attractive, extremely essential product. The hotspots concept was presented in another title of the collection we have been producing for CEMEX. In the proposal we are making today, that concept has been strengthened thanks to an updating of information on the former hotspots and data on new areas that have been defined as such, which altogether more than justify the publication of this volume. However, there is another reason which, in my opinion, is also very important: the rules of the market. As a conservation movement, we have forgotten that we live in a consumers’ society and that any product we wish to introduce onto the market should be handled according to certain rules. Moreover, we must continually redesign the product we are selling —in this case, the new priority ecoregions of the world— to keep our public interested and thus gain greater penetration and have a better market position.

For this reason, one of the problems we confronted in producing this book has turned into an obstacle keeping us from really being effective in communicational terms. The scientific bases defining this conservation strategy are novel, compelling, and foresighted, but that is not enough to make them reach decisionmakers. Every decision calls for the support of a majority of society, sometimes running against the economic interests of minority groups that could be affected. The need to transform the natural world into a product that society demands leads us to another matter. Biodiversity includes all plant and animal species, not necessarily only those that are known or even charismatic. Nature as people are familiar with it, that which seems most appealing to us, is but a minimal fraction of biological diversity. Countless books and magazines have filled our eyes with images of beautiful flagship species —some of which have even become icons for conservation campaigns—, while the great majority of species, among them endemic ones, are virtually unknown. When producing this book, we found ourselves faced with the huge problem of a lack of images for many species and regions that have not been photographed by professionals because they are not appealing enough for most publications. In that sense, we are inspired by the work of Cristina Mittermeier, one of the compilers of this book, in getting together a group of photographers that will open up new perspectives for communicating the most pressing priorities for nature conservation. For their part, scientific institutions should incorporate the concept of marketing in their structure; in fact, communication departments of conservation organizations will have to become true “advertising agencies.” That is the only way our product, the natural world, will benefit from an attractive, novel form of promotion that may successfully compete in the aggressive world of sales. They say that money makes the world go round. Today we have the opportunity to define our future and, by taking strategic advantage of marketing and advertising, we may decide what course we wish our planet to take in the future. PATRICIO ROBLES GIL President Agrupación Sierra Madre and Unidos para la Conservación

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FOREWORD Five years ago, I was asked by my colleagues at Conservation International to write the Foreword for Hotspots, an ambitious assessment of our planet’s atrisk biodiversity. Although I have had the honor and privilege to serve on CI’s board of directors for the past 12 years, I was reluctant to accept the assignment. I’m not a biologist, nor an expert on global strategies to safeguard threatened species and vanishing habitats. But I am deeply concerned about the future of our planet. It is clear that any effort to address these complicated issues would demand the most complete and scrupulous scientific understanding. As part of the initial analysis, all of the world’s major terrestrial environments had been inventoried, with 25 emerging as having exceptional endemism, being severely threatened, and in need of immediate conservation attention. Some of these regions were regarded as obvious priorities right from the start. Others came as surprises as the data was analyzed. The original Hotspots had a remarkable effect. BBC Wildlife Magazine, in celebration of its 40th anniversary, declared Hotspots one of the Top 40 Wildlife Classics published during the last four decades. Shortly after publication of Hotspots, the World Bank, the Global Environmental Facility (GEF), the MacArthur Foundation, and the Government of Japan joined with Conservation International to create the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund (CEPF), and to date have committed $125 million specifically for conserving the world’s hotspots. Meanwhile, a growing number of institutions continue to incorporate the results into their programs. Perhaps just as importantly, the hotspots analysis has spawned serious debates about where today’s precious conservation dollars should be spent to achieve the greatest future impact. The study focused squarely on one issue —preserving biodiversity— and then systematically measured, assessed, and assigned priorities. One could argue that it would be better to focus on global issues of birth control, poverty, disease, unsustainable energy use or atmospheric pollution. Undoubtedly, these are clearly critical in the long term to the quality of life on Earth. But in the race to prevent the extinction of the greatest portion of Earth’s living heritage, nothing advances our understanding and guides our strategies as well as the hotspots model.

That’s why this updated analysis is so important and why it has quickly become another essential element in the conservationist’s tool chest. The experts have added several new regions to an already substantial list of global priorities. These new hotspots range from the Pine-Oak Forests of Mexico and the southwestern U.S. to the Horn of Africa, from the Himalaya to Japan. Some of these regions, like those of the Solomons and Vanuatu that form the new East Melanesian Islands Hotspot, didn’t make the original hotspot list because their habitats were still largely intact. They weren’t considered threatened at the time. Yet in the blink of an eye, their condition has essentially slipped from more or less stable to critical. The most significant challenge of our time is to preserve and protect our biotic legacy. CI’s mission to defend biodiversity places its staff in some 40 countries around the world, in partnership with an amazing diversity of institutions and individuals from various backgrounds and cultures. The strategies they have applied are informed by sound, independent science. They have developed broad experience in determining how best to respond to crisis situations, while at the same time planning for the future in incremental steps. I wish you good reading and hope that this book helps broaden your perspective and understanding of the challenge of conserving the natural world. HARRISON FORD

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EARTH’S BIOLOGICALLY RICHEST AND MOST

CALIFORNIA FLORISTIC PROVINCE 118

ENDANGERED TERRESTRIAL ECOREGIONS

CAUCASUS 148

MEDITERRANEAN BASIN 144

MOUNTAINS OF CENTRAL ASIA 297

MADREAN PINE-OAK WOODLANDS 205

IRANO-ANATOLIAN 287

HIMALAYA 309

MOUNTAINS OF SOUTHWEST CHINA 159 JAPAN 333

CARIBBEAN ISLANDS 112

TAIWAN 361

MESOAMERICA 103

POLYNESIA-MICRONESIA 197

EASTERN AFROMONTANE 241

GUINEAN FORESTS OF WEST AFRICA 123

TUMBESCHOCÓMAGDALENA 80

WESTERN GHATS AND SRI LANKA 152

POLYNESIA-MICRONESIA 197

ATLANTIC FOREST 84

SUCCULENT KAROO 134

CAPE FLORISTIC REGION 130

MAPUTALANDPONDOLAND-ALBANY 219

EAST MELANESIAN ISLANDS 347

SUNDALAND 164

MADAGASCAR AND THE INDIAN OCEAN ISLANDS 138

TROPICAL ANDES 73

CHILEAN WINTER RAINFALL VALDIVIAN FORESTS 99

PHILIPPINES 179

HORN OF AFRICA 277 COASTAL FORESTS OF EASTERN AFRICA 231

CERRADO 93

INDOBURMA 323

WALLACEA 172

QUEENSLAND WET TROPICS 369 NEW CALEDONIA 193

SOUTHWEST AUSTRALIA 183

NEW ZEALAND 187

INTRODUCTION Global Priority Setting for Biodiversity Conservation Life on Earth faces a crisis of historical and planetary proportions. Unsustainable consumption in many northern countries and crushing poverty in the tropics are destroying wild nature. Expanding agriculture, industry, and urbanization are fragmenting and eliminating natural environments; accidental and deliberate introduction of exotic species is wreaking havoc on native communities; pollution is altering complex biogeochemical and climate cycles through the land, air, and water; and hunting, trade, and overfishing are decimating the last populations of large vertebrate species (Vitousek et al. 1997). Biodiversity is besieged. Extinction is the gravest aspect of the biodiversity crisis: it is irreversible. While extinction is a natural proce...