Date of this Version
10-19-2016
Document Type
Article
Abstract
Terrestrial mammals are experiencing a massive collapse in their population sizes and geographical ranges around the world, but many of the drivers, patterns and consequences of this decline remain poorly understood. Here we provide an analysis showing that bushmeat hunting for mostly food and medicinal products is driving a global crisis whereby 301 terrestrial mammal species are threatened with extinction. Nearly all of these threatened species occur in developing countries where major coexisting threats include deforestation, agricultural expansion, human encroachment and competition with livestock. The unrelenting decline of mammals suggests many vital ecological and socio-economic services that these species provide will be lost, potentially changing ecosystems irrevocably. We discuss options and current obstacles to achieving effective conservation, alongside consequences of failure to stem such anthropogenic mammalian extirpation. We propose a multi-pronged conservation strategy to help save threatened mammals from immediate extinction and avoid a collapse of food security for hundreds of millions of people.
Originally Published In
Royal Society Open Science
PMID
27853564
DOI
10.1098/rsos.160498
Recommended Citation
Ripple, William J.; Abernethy, Katharine; Betts, Matthew G.; Chapron, Guillaume; Dirzo, Rodolfo; Galetti, Mauro; Levi, Taal; Lindsey, Peter A.; Macdonald, David W.; Machovina, Brian; Newsome, Thomas M.; Peres, Carlos A.; Wallach, Arian D.; Wolf, Christopher; and Young, Hillary, "Bushmeat hunting and extinction risk to the world's mammals" (2016). All Faculty. 168.
https://digitalcommons.fiu.edu/all_faculty/168
Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.
Rights Statement
In Copyright. URI: http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/
This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).