Treatment of climate change in extinction risk assessments and recovery plans for threatened species

Abstract

The ongoing threat of climate change poses an increasing risk to biodiversity, especially for currently threatened species. Climate change can both directly impact species and interact with other pre-existing threats, such as habitat loss, to further amplify species' risk of extinction. Recognizing the threat of climate change in extinction risk assessments and recovery planning for imperilled species is essential for tailoring and prioritizing recovery actions for climatethreatened species. Using species legally listed in Canada we show that 44.1% of species' risk assessments identify the threat of climate change, nonetheless, 43.5% of assessments completely omit climate change. Species assessed more recently were more likely to be identified as climate-threatened, however, the strength of this relationship varied across taxonomic groups. The likelihood that climate change was identified as a threat was also strongly affected by the use of a standardized threat assessment process. Of the climate-threatened species, less than half (46.0%) of species' recovery plans specified actions aimed explicitly at minimizing climate impacts and only 3.8% of recovery plans recommended habitat or population management actions. Climate-targeted recovery actions were more likely to be included in more recent plans, and were marginally more likely for species where climate change was considered a major threat. Our findings highlight the urgent need for consistent and standardized assessments of the threat of climate change, including the consideration of potential synergies between climate change and other existing threats. Performing species-specific climate change vulnerability assessments may serve to complement existing assessment and recovery planning processes. We provide additional recommendations aimed at threatened species recovery planners for improving the integration of the threat of climate change into species extinction risk assessments and recovery planning processes for listed species.Extinction risk assessments address climate change threats over time, few recovery documents include specific climate-targeted actions.

An inconvenient misconception: Climate change is not the principal driver of biodiversity loss

“…Detailed case studies, using a variety of metrics, point to climate change being of less immediate importance than other anthropogenic factors, principally habitat loss. Even in northern latitudes, where climate change might be expected to be the primary force adversely affecting populations, the situation is similar: for endangered species in Canada, 44% of risk assessments identified climate change as a threat, but 56% did not (Naujokaitis‐Lewis et al, 2021). Taken together, our examinations and those of others (e.g., Maxwell et al., 2016) reveal that climate change is not the principal driver of current population declines or species extinctions.…”

The role of genomics in the future of ESA decision-making

“…The U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) provides a framework for the protection and recovery of threatened and endangered species and their habitats in the face of anthropogenic threats, including habitat modification (e.g., loss, fragmentation, degradation, transformation), overexploitation, disease, and climate change (Leu et al, 2019;Naujokaitis-Lewis et al, 2021). Genetic information has played a role in decision-making under the ESA for decades, most commonly informing taxonomy and the designation of distinct population segments (DPSs; Avise, 1989) though detection of inbreeding also played an early role (O'Brien, 1994).…”

The IUCN Green Status of Species: A Call for Mediterranean Botanists to Contribute to This New Ambitious Effort

“…However, the effects of these activities are easily detected; conversely, some well-known threatening factors with less detectable impacts (e.g., climate change, invasive species) are not yet clearly linked to species decline or extinction risk [ 8 , 9 ]. This is possibly due to the lack of knowledge of the ecological processes impacted by such factors, and the lack of reliable risk assessment methods [ 10 , 11 ]. In fact, despite increasing evidence of the impact of climate change on the survival of many species, its impact is quantitatively considered in only a small number of assessments of extinction risk [ 11 , 12 ].…”

“…This is possibly due to the lack of knowledge of the ecological processes impacted by such factors, and the lack of reliable risk assessment methods [ 10 , 11 ]. In fact, despite increasing evidence of the impact of climate change on the survival of many species, its impact is quantitatively considered in only a small number of assessments of extinction risk [ 11 , 12 ].…”