Best of our wild blogs: 15 Sep 10

Pasir Ris water quality fails, again: why?
from wild shores of singapore

Pasir Ris beach is alive!
from wild shores of singapore and Rare mangroves at Pasir Ris

Cleaning up our reef site!
from Psychedelic Nature

Chronicle of Mr & Mrs King
from Life's Indulgences

都是绿鹭吗？ Are they both little herons?
from PurpleMangrove

Asian Dowitchers at Sungei Buloh Wetland Reserve
from Mendis' World

How frequently do Pacific Swallows breed?
from Bird Ecology Study Group

Venus Drive
from talfryn.net and Sungei Buloh

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Economics will help further green policies in Singapore

Forum: ideals must filter down to affect public sentiment
Lynn Kan Business Times 15 Sep 10;

WHILE energy-efficient technology is more available and more affordable these days, what will ultimately push businesses to use it will be market-driven incentives, according to academics and building owners at a recent roundtable discussion organised by climate solutions company Trane.

Michael Quah, a professor of the Energy Studies Institute, said: 'Technology is an absolutely necessary but insufficient condition. The other condition that must come along is the economic view.'

Setting targets for cutting carbon emissions - such as those set out in a report by the Economic Strategies Committee - is one way that the market and state are driving behaviour change.

Chou SK, a professor of the National University of Singapore's mechanical engineering department, said at the roundtable: 'These incentives - what we call fruits on the ground - are already there. They're no longer low-hanging fruit - they're already on the ground and we would be silly not to pick them.'

The roundtable brought service-oriented businesses and building owners - Khoo Teck Puat Hospital, Shangri-La Hotel, and United World College - face to face with academics from the Energy Studies Institute think-tank, the NUS mechanical engineering department and Trane.

As it turns out, some institutions and businesses have already been nudged to go green by the lure of cost savings.

Khoo Teck Puat Hospital's decision - using more natural ventilation, having gardens - was 'first and foremost to save money', said Alexandra Health CEO Liak Teng Lit. Alexandra Hospital's energy bill is about $500,000 a year.

It has become apparent that the hospital's natural features have also improved patients' well-being. 'Many tests have shown that in healthcare, when you have a conducive environment - lots of nature, you can see out doors - patients recover faster,' said Mr Liak. 'They require fewer pain-killers, recover faster, are less depressed and get home faster because their mood affects how fast they recover.'

While hitting targets is important, some at the roundtable questioned whether they are wholly capable of ensuring behaviour changes on the ground. They cited the example of Building and Construction Authority's Green Mark accreditation scheme that grades buildings' environmental impact based on a scorecard system.

Participants agreed that Green Mark is a step in the right direction. But 'it misses the point when it comes to philosophy', said United World College (UWC)'s director of facilities and projects Simon Thomas, who pointed out that behaviour and processes within a building cannot be captured by a one-off points grading.

'But, we pursue Green Mark because of its commercial value and there are parents and students who are demanding more sustainable building and practices,' said Mr Thomas.

The spoke in the proverbial wheel is that targets haven't trickled down to the ground to affect public sentiment yet. 'Ultimately, targets must come full circle,' said Prof Chou. 'This means they will have to eventually drive behaviour that will enable business and industry to become competitive and affect the pocket of the last man on the street.'

One possible way to embed the green mindset is to go the way of UWC Southeast Asia, which has taken upon itself the role of green educator through its building facilities, said Mr Thomas. The school makes everything - water and electric meters - prominent so 'you can't escape them and you'll know your electricity consumption for the particular day and week', he said.

UWC has also has set up a green patrol squad at its new campus, reminding parents and students alike to mind their environmental Ps and Qs. 'We have the green police to hopefully change behaviour. Everything from recycling to parents being idle in their cars, using their cars, not car pooling, to students not using public transport,' said Mr Thomas. Even the UWC car park has gone green, with an effective 'tax' levied on cars 'to try to force decisions to be made'.

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Fishing could feed 20 million more if better managed: study

Yahoo News 15 Sep 10;

VANCOUVER (AFP) – A landmark study by scientists and economists has estimated that better management of the world's wild fisheries could feed 20 million more people, especially in impoverished countries.

Researchers at the Fisheries Centre in Vancouver released Tuesday the first global estimate of the value of the industry, set at 240 billion dollars, but warned that government subsidies encourage over-fishing that is destroying the resource.

The work is "the first big-picture analysis of the value fisheries have for people worldwide," said Rebecca Goldburg, a scientist with the Pew Environment Group, which funded the research. The reports were released via a telephone news conference Tuesday from the Pew Trusts in Washington.

Key findings of the series of four reports, published Tuesday in the Journal of Bioeconomics, include:

- Global wild fisheries are worth 240 billion dollars annually when multipliers such as processing are included.

- Fisheries could feed 20 million more people if over-fishing were eliminated.

- Ocean-related sports fishing, whale watching and diving, account for one million jobs, a value up to 47 billion dollars.

- Of 27 billion dollars in annual fishery subsidies, such as for cheap fuel, 16 billion dollars worsens over-fishing that destroys fish stocks.

"Maintaining healthy fisheries makes good economic sense," said Rashid Sumaila, director of the Fisheries Centre at the University of British Columbia in western Canada, which led the research.

The value of fisheries was historically measured by the landed value at dockside, which in 2000 was 85 billion dollars worldwide, Sumaila told AFP in an interview.

The study was the first globally to put a figure on the industry taking into account the many economic spin-offs, he said.

"In terms of the global economy, this is not a big amount, you?re talking a small fraction of trillions," Sumaila acknowledged. But he said an accurate assessment of the ocean harvest -- as well as its food security worth -- will give governments an incentive to better manage stocks.

Sumaila told AFP up to half of all wild fish populations are now over-fished and in the process of "crashing" or have already crashed -- as did once-bountiful northern cod in the North Atlantic nearly 20 years ago.

"If we don?t do something now, we are likely to lose most of these benefits," said Sumaila. With better management, "we could have met the needs of 20 million people in malnourished countries."

He recommended governments start by redirecting industry subsidies from fuel and other areas that worsen over-fishing, to research and helping fishers adopt sustainable methods.

"Large developed countries are spending twice the amount of taxpayer money on global fisheries subsidies that encourage overfishing than they are on subsidies that protect oceans," said the report.

The researchers used data from international catches of wild fish in 2000, within the economic zones of all countries. Further research now under way using data up to 2008 will include an analysis of the corporate structure of the fishing industry, said Sumaila.

Global fisheries research finds promise and peril
While industry contributes $240B annually, overfishing takes toll on people and revenue
University of British Columbia EurekAlert 14 Sep 10;

Global fisheries, a vital source of food and revenue throughout the world, contribute between US$225-$240 billion per year to the worldwide economy, according to four new studies released today. Researchers also concluded that healthier fisheries could have prevented malnourishment in nearly 20 million people in poorer countries.

This first comprehensive, peer-reviewed estimate of the global economic contribution of fisheries was published online today in four papers as part of a special issue of the Journal of Bioeconomics.

This research, conducted by the University of British Columbia's Fisheries Centre, with support from the Pew Environment Group, quantifies the social and economic value of fish around the world and also calculates the loss of both revenue and dependable protein sources from years of overfishing.

"We know fish play an important ecological role in the marine environment, but these studies assess their 'out-of-the-water' value to people across the globe," says lead economist Associate Professor Rashid Sumaila at the University of British Columbia's Fisheries Centre. "Whether you are looking at fish as a financial resource or a source of protein, our research shows that the benefits of healthy, robust fisheries have enormous value far beyond the fishing dock."

Dr. Sumaila and his team of researchers also found that:

* Overfishing reduces revenue. Annually, estimated global catch losses from overfishing totaled up to seven to 36 per cent of the actual tonnage landed in a year, resulting in a landed value loss of between US$6.4-36 billion each year.
* Fishing has a multiplier effect. The fishing industry's economic impact on related businesses, such as boat building, international transport and bait suppliers, is roughly three times larger than the value of fish at first sale.
* Fisheries generate incomes. Wild fisheries generate more than US$63 billion in annual household incomes around the world.
* Non-industrial uses of the oceans are a net positive for economies and jobs. Recreational use of ocean ecosystems by sport divers, whale watchers and recreational fishermen contributes US$47 billion each year to national economies worldwide and generates nearly 1.1 million jobs.

One of the four papers focused on global fisheries subsidies, or financial incentives that countries offer to their fishing industries, which may contribute to depleted fish stocks. Large developed countries are spending twice the amount of tax-payer money on global fisheries subsidies that encourage overfishing than they are on subsidies that protect oceans.

"Many economies are paying doubly for continued overfishing of our oceans," says Sumaila. "First, tax-payer money is directly contributing to the decline of worldwide fisheries, and second, fishermen and undernourished people are hurting from a steadily declining resource. From a socioeconomic standpoint, subsidies that promote overfishing are doing far more harm than good."

World Pays High Price For Overfishing, Studies Say
Allan Dowd PlanetArk 15 Sep 10;

Decades of overfishing have deprived the food industry of billions of dollars in revenue and the world of fish that could have helped feed undernourished countries, according to a series of studies released on Tuesday.

The Canadian, U.S. and British researchers behind the studies also said that overfishing is often the result of government subsidies that would have been better spent conserving fish stocks.

Fisheries contribute $225 billion to $240 billion to the world economy annually, but if fishing practices were more sustainable, that amount would be up to $36 billion higher, according to the four papers published in the Journal of Bioeconomics.

The researchers said the data demonstrate that the reasons for protecting world's ocean fish stocks from unsustainable fishing are more than just biological.

"Maintaining healthy fisheries makes good economic sense, while overfishing is clearly bad business," said Rashid Sumaila, an economist at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, who led the research.

The researchers estimated that from 1950 to 2004, 36 to 53 percent of the fish stocks in more than half the exclusive economic zones in the world's oceans were overfished, with up to 10 million tonnes of fish catch now lost.

They said many governments underestimate the financial impact of overfishing, such as the affect on related industries, and, as a result, they have less incentive to protect fish stocks.

It is the poor in developing nations who are hurt the most by overfishing because they cannot replace through imports the nutrition and revenue that is lost, the researchers said.

Fish that would have been available had it not been for past overfishing could have helped feed nearly 20 million undernourished people a year in poorer counties, the researchers estimated.

The researchers used international data on ocean fish stocks in their studies, and did not include data from aquaculture and fresh water fisheries, although they said they hope to include that information in future studies.

Governments around the world provide up to $27 billion in subsidies annually to the fishing industry, but about 60 percent of that goes to supporting unsustainable fishing practices, the studies said.

"Taxpayer money is directly contributing to the decline of worldwide fish stocks," Sumaila said.

The researchers said counties are also missing economic opportunities by not promoting alternative uses of fisheries, such as whale watching and other marine recreational activities.

(Editing by Peter Galloway)

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Ending the oceans' 'tragedy of the commons'

ARC Centre of Excellence in Coral Reef Studies EurekAlert 14 Sep 10;

Leading international marine scientists are proposing radical changes in the governance of the world's oceans to rescue them from overfishing, pollution and other human impacts.

Based on a successful experiment in Chile, the researchers say a new approach to marine tenure could help to reverse the maritime 'tragedy of the commons' which has led to the depletion of fish stocks worldwide.

"Marine ecosystems are in decline around the world. New transformational changes in governance are urgently required to cope with overfishing, pollution, global changes, and other drivers of degradation," says Professor Terry Hughes of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies and James Cook University, one of the authors of a new scientific paper advocating sweeping reform of ocean governance.

"In recent years there has been a growing appreciation that the health of ecosystems like the oceans and human wellbeing are closely linked," says co-author Dr. Per Olsson of the Stockholm Resilience Centre. "Unfortunately, typical governance arrangements don't effectively link these two essential elements, when trying to manage fishing pressure for example. They are often too rigid and don't cope well with surprises or changed conditions."

A combination of fisheries collapses and the move to democracy in Chile, quite by chance, provided the opportunity to try out some new arrangements for looking after fisheries, involving a partnership of fishers, scientists and managers.

"There was a general recognition that Chile's fish stocks were in trouble," says Professor Carl Folke, also from the Stockholm Resilience Centre and the Beijer Institute. "Things were turbulent and people were looking for answers and that made them open to new approaches. There was also good scientific understanding of the coastal ecosystems of the region on which to base a new management plan."

Fishers and scientists had been working together on the problem for some years, sharing knowledge and building trust. This led to the trialling of new co-operative models for fishery management, based on the latest that science can reveal about the state of the fish stock and the surrounding marine ecosystem.

The result is a revolutionary national system of marine tenure that allocates user rights and responsibilities to collectives of fishers.

"Although fine tuning is always needed to continue to build resilience of this new regime, this transformation has improved the sustainability of the interconnected social–ecological system," Prof Folke adds.

A vital ingredient in the change was the move by Chile to democracy after a 17-year dictatorship. This opened the way for reform of the laws governing fishing rights.

The new laws gave exclusive ocean territories to local 'artisanal' fishers, and excluded the big industrial fishing fleets, which had their own exclusive fishing zone.

Scientists and small fishers then worked together to understand and rebuild the shattered fish stocks in their zone, leading to a shared vision and voluntary agreements on how to manage them. Fishing pressure was reduced in the industrial fishing zone by cutting the number of big vessels.

Professor Hughes says the Chilean experience contains lessons which can potentially apply anywhere in the world where a fishery is in trouble and there is good scientific data on the marine environment.

"You need a shared recognition that something has to be done, you need a good understanding of the marine ecosystem and how to regenerate it, you need a strong rapport between scientists and fishers, and you need a political moment when sweeping changes can be brought in," he says.

"If you have all those things, there is a good chance you can avoid the marine 'tragedy of the commons' which has been a feature of fisheries around the world in the past half century."

The research indicates the key to managing fisheries may depend on creating agreements that are both voluntary and flexible enough to cope with changes in the ocean environment, leading to fisheries that are both ecologically and socially sustainable.

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"Navigating transformations in governance of Chilean marine coastal resources" by Stefan Gelcich, Terry P. Hughes, Per Olsson, Carl Folke, Omar Defeo, Miriam Fernándeza, Simon Foale, Lance H. Gunderson, Carlos Rodríguez-Sickert, Marten Scheffer, Robert S. Steneck and Juan C. Castilla appears in the latest issue of the Proceedings of the US National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

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Killing the cures: how biodiversity loss is harming medical science

Editorial by Achim Steiner, Eric Chivian and Aaron Bernstein
UNEP 9 Sep 10;

09 September 2010 - Biodiversity is essential for the functioning of ecosystems - from forests and fresh waters to coral reefs, soils, and even the atmosphere - that sustain all life on Earth. The ongoing and escalating disappearance of that diversity will harm society in myriad ways. One way that is often overlooked is the damaging impact on medical science.

For millennia, medical practitioners have harnessed substances from nature for treatments and cures: aspirin from the willow and, more recently, Taxol - the groundbreaking anti-cancer drug - from the bark of the Pacific yew. Some of the biggest breakthroughs may be yet to come. But this can happen only if nature's cornucopia is conserved, so that current and future generations of researchers can make new discoveries that benefit patients everywhere.

Consider the polar bear, threatened with extinction in the wild by climate change. These mammals spend up to seven months of the year hibernating, during which time they are essentially immobile. A human would lose a third or more of bone mass when immobile for this period of time.

Astonishingly, hibernating bears lay down new bone, by producing a substance that inhibits cells that break down bone and promotes those that produce bone and cartilage. Studying hibernating bears in the wild may lead to new ways of preventing the millions of hip fractures that result from osteoporosis - a disease that costs $18 billion and kills 70,000 people each year in the United States alone.

While hibernating bears can also survive for seven months or more without excreting their urinary wastes, humans would die from the buildup of these toxic substances after only a few days. Unraveling how the bears accomplish this miraculous feat may offer hope to the estimated 1.5 million people worldwide receiving treatment for kidney failure.

Polar bears, which pile on fat to survive hibernation and yet do not become diabetic, may also hold clues for treating Type II diabetes, a disease associated with obesity that afflicts more than 190 million people worldwide, reaching epidemic proportions in many countries.

But hibernating bears are just the beginning of the story. The wood frog can survive long periods of freezing temperatures without suffering cell damage. Might it hold the key to a way to better preserve scarce organs needed for transplants?

Pumiliotoxins, like those manufactured by the Panamanian poison frog, may lead to medicines that strengthen heart contractions - important in treating cardiac disease. And the 700 species of coral reef-dwelling cone snails may produce up to 140,000 different toxins, large numbers of which may have value as medicinal compounds. Yet only about a hundred have been investigated.

One of these toxins, now available as the drug PrialtÔ, has been shown to be 1,000 times more potent than morphine, without causing addiction or tolerance, as opiates do. Clinical trials indicate significant pain relief for advanced cancer and AIDS patients.

The loss of biodiversity has already closed promising new avenues of medical research. Australia's gastric brooding frog, Rheobatrachus, begins life in the female's stomach, where it would, in all other vertebrates, be digested by enzymes and acid. This could have led to new insights into preventing and treating peptic ulcers, but studies could not be continued: both species ofRheobatrachus are now extinct.

In 2010, the United Nations International Year of Biodiversity, governments are supposed to reduce substantially the rate of loss of the world's rich array of animals, plants, and other organisms. This has not happened. Indeed, the pace of biodiversity loss has accelerated, and we are rapidly entering what scientists are calling "the sixth wave of extinctions."

The next opportunity for governments to commit to reversing these losses comes at the 65th UN General Assembly in New York this September, followed by the meeting of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) in Nagoya, Japan.

This needs to be the year when a cure for environmental degradation is found and a far more intelligent management of a natural world starts taking shape: this will be a key breakthrough for the wealth but also increasingly the health of humanity in the 21st century.

Eric Chivian and Aaron Bernstein are physicians and researchers at the Center for Health and the Global Environment, Harvard Medical School, and the lead authors of Sustaining Life: How Human Health Depends on Biodiversity. Achim Steiner is a United Nations Under-Secretary General and Executive Director of the UN Environment Programme

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Last Stronghold of Endangered Tigers Identified

Charles Q. Choi LiveScience.com Yahoo News 14 Sep 10;

Scientists have identified the last strongholds for tigers - 42 sites scattered across Asia where the species' roughly 1,000 remaining breeding females could potentially restore populations of the endangered big cats.

The number of wild tigers has never been lower. Fewer than 3,500 tigers remain in the wild, and they are now clustered in less than 7 percent of the roughly 580,000 square miles (1.5 million square kilometers) of suitable habitat remaining for them in Asia. This dire situation is the result of overhunting, habitat loss and the wildlife trade. The demand for tiger body parts used in traditional medicines is driving most of the decline.

"The tiger is facing its last stand as a species," said John Robinson, the Wildlife Conservation Society's executive vice president for conservation and science.

The newly identified tiger strongholds currently hold nearly 70 percent of the world's remaining wild tigers.

"The team brought together probably all the people working with tigers in the various range states - the 13 countries where tigers have historically occurred - and identified the areas where there were significant populations of tigers, and provided estimates of tiger population densities within those areas," Robinson explained. "In some cases, those estimates were based on censuses of tigers, and in some other cases they were based on censuses of prey animals - there's a very tight correlation between the number of prey and tiger populations."

Researchers suggest these areas, which altogether encompass about 35,000 square miles (90,000 square kilometers) - less than a half-percent of the species' historical range - offer the last hope and prime concern for the conservation and recovery of the world's largest cat.

"While the scale of the challenge is enormous, the complexity of effective implementation is not," said researcher Joe Walston, director of the Wildlife Conservation Society's Asia program. "In the past, overly ambitious and complicated conservation efforts have failed to do the basics - prevent the hunting of tigers and their prey."

With so many of the remaining tigers clustered in a small area, Walston said "efforts need to focus on securing these sites as the number one priority for the species."

Each of these sites is able to maintain more than 25 breeding females and is located within a larger region that has the potential to support more than 50 breeding females. They are also located in areas that already possess conservation infrastructures and legal mandates for tiger protection.

Eighteen of these sites are in India, holding roughly 1,000 tigers, which the researchers said made India the most important country for the species. Sumatra held another eight, while the Russian Far East contained six. There is no longer any evidence of breeding populations of tigers in Cambodia, China, Vietnam and North Korea.

The scientists calculated the total required annual cost of effectively managing these strongholds at $82 million, which included the cost of law enforcement, wildlife monitoring, getting the community involved in their protection and other factors. Although that might seem a large price tag, $47 million of that is already provided by the governments of the areas where the sites are located, supplemented by international support, the researchers said. The $35 million shortfall is needed to intensify proven methods of protection and monitoring.

"$35 million is less than what [New York Yankees baseball player] Alex Rodriguez made last year in salary and endorsements," Robinson told Our Amazing Planet. "There's quite a bit of money floating into protected areas at this time - the shortfall is not huge." Robinson noted he was recently in talks in Washington, D.C., with representatives of some multilateral government agencies to talk about this funding for tigers.

The researchers detailed their findings online Sept. 14 in the journal PLoS Biology.

Pricetag set for tiger conservation
Richard Black, BBC News 14 Sep 10;

The cost of keeping tigers alive in the wild is about $80m (£50m) per year, say conservationists - but only about $50m (£30m) per year is being pledged.

The figures come from a new assessment that suggests targeting efforts in 42 selected breeding sites.

Building tiger populations in these sites would enable other areas to be re-populated later, the researchers report in the journal PLoS Biology.

About 3,500 tigers remain in the wild, and only about 1,000 breeding females.

Although conservation programmes are operating in some countries, notably India, the tiger has virtually disappeared from vast tracts of Asia where it used to live.

Once found from Turkey to the eastern coast of Russia, it is now concentrated in pockets of South and East Asia, though even here it is extinct in some countries such as Pakistan and down to fewer than 50 individuals in others, including Cambodia, China, Laos and Vietnam.

The animals are found in only about 7% of their historical range.

But the new study suggests conservation would benefit from concentrating efforts into still smaller areas - specifically, into 42 "source sites" that make up only about 6% of the tiger's current range, or about 0.5% of the area it used to span.

"The long-term goal is to conserve an Asia-wide network of large landscapes where tigers can flourish," said Nigel Leader-Williams from Cambridge University, one of the scientists on this study.

"The immediate priority, however, must be to ensure that the few breeding populations still in existence can be protected and monitored. Without this, all other efforts are bound to fail."
Summit issue

The figure of $82m per year is the cost of safeguarding and monitoring populations in these 42 key sites.

All but 10 lie in India, Sumatra and the eastern extremities of Russia.

"A number of these source sites are already in protected areas," noted John Robinson, executive vice-president for conservation and science with the Wildlife Conservation Society (WCS).

"However, in many of them the protection is weak, and it would not take much to push them over the edge," he told BBC News.

More than half of the figure is already being provided by the range states themselves, by international donors and by conservation groups.

But the shortfall is about $35m (£23m) - and unless the money is found, this study concludes the tigers will not endure across what remains of its range.

The big hope this year is the Tiger Summit, to be hosted by Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in St Petersburg.

Orignally slated for this week, it has been postponed until November in the hope of attracting a greater number of national leaders.

One of the facts they will consider is that there are now many more tigers in captivity than in the wild.

While that might seem to indicate how far the creature is from its natural place in the world, Dr Robinson prefers to find a glimmer of optimism.

"It says something about the fact that tigers can breed easily, if you can protect them," he said.

"They do this in captivity; and if we can protect them in the wild too, they can bounce back."

Last strongholds for tigers identified in new study
42 source sites scattered over Asia represent last hope for world's biggest cats
Wildlife Conservation Society EurekAlert 14 Sep 10;

NEW YORK (Embargoed until September 14, 2010: 5:00 p.m. U.S. Eastern Time)— A new peer-reviewed paper by the Wildlife Conservation Society and other groups reveals an ominous finding: most of the world's last remaining tigers—long decimated by overhunting, logging, and wildlife trade—are now clustered in just six percent of their available habitat. The paper identifies 42 'source sites' scattered across Asia that are now the last hope and greatest priority for the conservation and recovery of the world's largest cat.

The securing of the tiger's remaining source sites is the most effective and efficient way of not only preventing extinction but seeding a recovery of the wild tiger, the study's authors say. The researchers also assert that effective conservation efforts focused on these sites are both possible and economically feasible, requiring an additional $35 million a year for increased monitoring and enforcement to enable tiger numbers to double in these last strongholds.

The study—published online by PLoS Biology—is authored by: Wildlife Conservation Society researchers Joe Walston, John Robinson, Elizabeth Bennett, John Goodrich, Melvin Gumal, Arlyne Johnson, Ullas Karanth, Dale Miquelle, Anak Pattanavibool, Colin Poole, Emma Stokes, Chanthavy Vongkhamheng, and Hariyo Wibisono; Urs Breitenmoser of the IUCN/SSC Cat Specialist Group; Gustavo Fonseca of the Global Environment Facility (GEF); Luke Hunter and Alan Rabinowitz of Panthera; Nigel Leader-Williams of the University of Cambridge; Kathy MacKinnon of the World Bank; Dave Smith of the University of Minnesota; and Simon Stuart, Chair of the IUCN's Species Survival Commission

"While the scale of the challenge is enormous, the complexity of effective implementation is not," said Joe Walston, Director of the Wildlife Conservation Society's Asia Program and lead author of the study. "In the past, overly ambitious and complicated conservation efforts have failed to do the basics: prevent the hunting of tigers and their prey. With 70 percent of the world's wild tigers in just six percent of their current range, efforts need to focus on securing these sites as the number one priority for the species."

According to the paper, fewer than 3,500 tigers remain in the wild, of which only about 1,000 are breeding females. Walston and his co-authors identified 42 tiger source sites, which were defined as sites that contain breeding populations of tigers and have the potential to seed the recovery of tigers across wider landscapes.

India was identified as the most important country for the species with 18 source sites. Sumatra contains eight source sites, and the Russian Far East contains six.

The authors calculate the total required annual cost of effectively managing source sites to be $82 million, which includes the cost of law enforcement, wildlife monitoring, community involvement, and other factors. However, much of that is already being provided by range state governments themselves, supplemented by international support. The shortfall—$35 million—is needed to intensify proven methods of protection and monitoring on the ground.

"The tiger is facing its last stand as a species," said Dr. John Robinson, Executive Vice President of Conservation and Science for the Wildlife Conservation Society. "As dire as the situation is for tigers, the Wildlife Conservation Society is confident that the world community will come together to save these iconic big cats from the brink for future generations. This study gives us a roadmap to make that happen."

Dr. Gustavo Fonseca, team leader of natural resources at the Global Environment Facility, said: "A key goal for us is to help identify the most efficient path forward so countries can achieve their global biodiversity conservation objectives. The GEF is pleased to have been able to contribute to this initial assessment focusing on the highest priority sites for the future of this magnificent species"

Alan Rabinowitz, President and CEO of Panthera, said: "We know how to save tigers. We have the knowledge and the tools to get the job done. What we are lacking is political will and financial support. The price tag to save one of the planet's great iconic species is not a high one."

The authors say that in spite of decades of effort by conservationists, tigers continue to be threatened by overhunting of both tigers and their prey, and by loss and fragmentation of habitat. Much of the decline is being driven by the demand for tiger body parts used in traditional medicines.

Tiger "clusters" seen as last hope for species-study
Reuters AlertNet 15 Sep 10;

SINGAPORE, Sept 15 (Reuters) - Asia's tiger population could be close to extinction with fewer than 3,500 tigers remaining in the wild and most clustered in fragmented areas making up less than 7 percent of their former range in Asia, a study says.

The study in the latest issue of the online journal PLoS Biology says saving tigers living in 42 sites across Asia from poachers, illegal loggers and the wildlife trade is crucial to prevent the species becoming extinct in the wild.

The cost of achieving this would be an additional $35 million a year in funding for law enforcement and monitoring, the report's lead authors from the U.S.-based Wildlife Conservation Society say.

The World Bank, global conservation organisation IUCN and Panthera, a big cat environmental group, also contributed to the study.

"The tiger is facing its last stand as a species," John Robinson, executive vice president of conservation and science for the Wildlife Conservation Society, said in a statement.

Of the tigers remaining in the wild, only about 1,000 are breeding females.

The authors said in spite of decades of efforts by conservationists, much of the decline was being driven by demand for tiger body parts used in traditional medicine. Overhunting of prey and destruction of hunting grounds were other reasons.

Lead author Joe Walston from WCS and his co-authors identified 42 tiger "source sites" that contained breeding populations of tigers and which had the potential to seed the recovery of tigers across wider areas.

India had 18 sites, the Indonesian island of Sumatra eight and the Russian far east six, with others in Malaysia, Thailand, Laos and Bangladesh.

"Based on available data, no source site was identified in Cambodia, China, North Korea or Vietnam," said the study. And it added that there was no evidence of breeding populations of tigers in Cambodia, China Vietnam or North Korea.

Most of the 42 source sites were small, under pressure from encroachment and with small tiger populations.

"Only five, all of which are in India, maintain tiger populations close to 80 percent of their estimated carrying capacity," the study says.

"Thus, the recovery of populations in source sites alone would result in a 70 percent increase in the world's tiger population."

The study was issued ahead of a major U.N. conference in Japan next month at which nations are expected to agree on new targets to try to halt the decline in the loss of plant and animal species.

The authors calculate the annual cost of managing the source sites at $82 million, which included the cost of law enforcement, wildlife monitoring, community involvement and other factors. (Reporting by David Fogarty; Editing by Sugita Katyal

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