Midiateca

Yellow fever threatens Atlantic Forest primates

Autores
ALEJANDRO ESTRADA, PAUL A. GARBER, ANTHONY B. RYLANDS, CHRISTIAN ROOS, EDUARDO FERNANDEZ-DUQUE, ANTHONY DI FIORE, K. ANNE-ISOLA NEKARIS, VINCENT NIJMAN, ECKHARD W. HEYMANN, JOANNA E. LAMBERT, FRANCESCO ROVERO, CLAUDIA BARELLI, JOANNA M. SETCHELL, THOMAS R. GILLESPIE, RUSSELL A. MITTERMEIER, LUIS VERDE ARREGOITIA, MIGUEL DE GUINEA, SIDNEY GOUVEIA, RICARDO DOBROVOLSKI, SAM SHANEE, NOGA SHANEE, SARAH A. BOYLE, AGUSTIN FUENTES, KATHERINE C. MACKINNON, KATHERINE R. AMATO, ANDREAS L. S. MEYER, SERGE WICH, ROBERT W. SUSSMAN, RULIANG PAN, INZA KONE, BAOGUO LI
Ano de Publicação
2017
Categoria
PESQUISA AVALIAÇÃO E MONITORAMENTO DA BIODIVERSIDADE
Descrição

Abstract

Nonhuman primates, our closest biological relatives, play important roles in the livelihoods, cultures, and religions of many societies and offer unique insights into human evolution, biology, behavior, and the threat of emerging diseases. They are an essential component of tropical biodiversity, contributing to forest regeneration and ecosystem health. Current information shows the existence of 504 species in 79 genera distributed in the Neotropics, mainland Africa, Madagascar, and Asia. Alarmingly, ~60% of primate species are now threatened with extinction and ~75% have declining populations. This situation is the result of escalating anthropogenic pressures on primates and their habitats—mainly global and local market demands, leading to extensive habitat loss through the expansion of industrial agriculture, large-scale cattle ranching, logging, oil and gas drilling, mining, dam building, and the construction of new road networks in primate range regions. Other important drivers are increased bushmeat hunting and the illegal trade of primates as pets and primate body parts, along with emerging threats, such as climate change and anthroponotic diseases. Often, these pressures act in synergy, exacerbating primate population declines. Given that primate range regions overlap extensively with a large, and rapidly growing, human population characterized by high levels of poverty, global attention is needed immediately to reverse the looming risk of primate extinctions and to attend to local human needs in sustainable ways. Raising global scientific and public awareness of the plight of the world’s primates and the costs of their loss to ecosystem health and human society is imperative.

Keywords
  • nonhuman primates
  • tropical forests
  • deforestation
  • hunting
  • illegal trade
  • primate conservation
  • sustainable land use
  • industrial agriculture
  • ecosystem health
  • rural livelihoods

INTRODUCTION

Nonhuman primates (primates hereafter) are of central importance to tropical biodiversity and to many ecosystem functions, processes, and services. They are our closest living biological relatives, offering critical insights into human evolution, biology, and behavior and playing important roles in the livelihoods, cultures, and religions of many societies. Unsustainable human activities are now the major force driving primate species to extinction. Here, we combine the most frequently used standard for species conservation status [the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List] with data from peer-reviewed scientific literature and from the United Nations databases to evaluate human-induced threats to primate survival. We examine trends in forest loss resulting from regional and global economic pressures and discuss the impacts of hunting, illegal trade, and other anthropogenic threats on primate populations. We also model agricultural expansion into the 21st century and identify expected spatial conflict within primate range areas. We assess the current level of scientific knowledge available for individual primate taxa, and we highlight the ecological, social, cultural, economic, and scientific importance of primates, as well as the global consequences of their population declines. We also consider future research needs and advances in technology for monitoring human-induced environmental changes that affect primate populations. Finally, we propose a conceptual model to guide the development of global, regional, and local approaches to promote primate conservation while at the same time attending to human needs. The goal of this review is not to produce a list of threats but rather to urge attention to the multiple global and regional anthropogenic factors that imperil primates worldwide and to encourage the development of sustainable and effective solutions that enhance primate survival in the medium and long term.
Tipo de publicação
Publicações periódicas (revistas, jornais, boletins)
Local da publicação
http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/3/1 http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/3/1/e1600946
Nº da edição ou volume
Science Advances 18 Jan 2017: Vol. 3, no. 1, e1600946 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.1600946
Editora
American Association for the Advance of Science
Link