Cultural keystone species as a tool for biocultural stewardship. A global review

The cultural keystone species (CKS) concept (i.e. ‘species that shape in a major way the cultural identity of a people’ as defined by Garibaldi and Turner in 2004) has been proposed as part of a common framing for the multiple entangled relationships between species and the socioecological systems in which they exist. However, the blurred and prolific definitions of CKS hamper its univocal application. This work examines the current use of the term CKS to reconcile a definition and explore its practical applications for biocultural stewardship. We ran a search for the words ‘cultural’ AND ‘keystone’ AND ‘species’. Our search was limited to peer‐reviewed articles published in English between 1994 and 2022 (inclusive) and was conducted using Google Scholar, PubMed, Scopus and Web of Science. We extracted and analysed bibliometric information as well as information on (i) the CKS components, (ii) humans' support for CKS and (iii) the definitions of CKS. From the 313 selected documents, the CKS concept appears to be increasingly accepted, as evidenced by a growing corpus of literature. However, the absence of a systematic and precise way of documenting CKS precludes global cross‐cultural comparisons. The geographical distribution of authors using the concept is biased. We found that 47% of all the CKS reported and 38% of the works identified in our review were located in North America. Beyond ‘supporting identity’, several other of nature's contributions to people are associated with the CKS definitions. However, the contributions of the sociocultural group to the survival and conservation of the CKS (i.e. stewardship) are made explicit only in one‐third of the documents reviewed. To advance biocultural stewardship as a conservation paradigm, we suggest (a) defining CKS as an indissoluble combination of a non‐human species and one or more sociocultural groups; (b) acknowledging that species and sociocultural group relations should be classified in a continuum, according to gradients of relationship intensity; and (c) explicitly acknowledging the reciprocal relationships between sociocultural groups and species. Read the free Plain Language Summary for this article on the Journal blog

The Manokwari Declaration: Challenges ahead in conserving 70% of Tanah Papua’s forests

The Manokwari Declaration is an unprecedented pledge by the governors of Indonesia’s two New Guinea provinces to promote conservation and become SE Asia’s new Costa Rica. This is an exciting, yet challenging endeavour that will require working on many fronts that transcend single disciplines. Because Indonesian New Guinea has the largest expanse of intact forests in SE Asia, large-scale conservation pledges like the Manokwari Declaration will have a global impact on biodiversity conservation and climate change mitigation

Plant Power:Opportunities and challenges for meeting sustainable energy needs from the plant and fungal kingdoms

Societal Impact Statement Bioenergy is a major component of the global transition to renewable energy technologies. The plant and fungal kingdoms offer great potential but remain mostly untapped. Their increased use could contribute to the renewable energy transition and addressing the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 7 “Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all.” Current research focuses on species cultivated at scale in temperate regions, overlooking the wealth of potential new sources of small‐scale energy where they are most urgently needed. A shift towards diversified, accessible bioenergy technologies will help to mitigate and adapt to the threats of climate change, decrease energy poverty, improve human health by reducing indoor pollution, increase energy resilience of communities, and decrease greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuels. Summary Bioenergy derived from plants and fungi is a major component of the global transition to renewable energy technologies. There is rich untapped diversity in the plant and fungal kingdoms that offers potential to contribute to the shift away from fossil fuels and to address the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG7) “Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all.” Energy poverty—the lack of access to modern energy services—is most acute in the Global South where biodiversity is greatest and least investigated. Our systematic review of the literature over the last 5 years (2015–2020) indicates that research efforts have targeted a very small number of plant species cultivated at scale, mostly in temperate regions. The wealth of potential new sources of bioenergy in biodiverse regions, where the implementation of SDG7 is most urgently needed, has been largely overlooked. We recommend next steps for bioenergy stakeholders—research, industry, and government—to seize opportunities for innovation to alleviate energy poverty while protecting biodiversity. Small‐scale energy production using native plant species in bioenergy landscapes overcomes many pitfalls associated with bioenergy crop monocultures, such as biodiversity loss and conflict with food production. Targeted trait‐based screening of plant species and biological screening of fungi are required to characterize the potential of this resource. The benefits of diversified, accessible bioenergy go beyond the immediate urgency of energy poverty as more diverse agricultural landscapes are more resilient, store more carbon, and could also reduce the drivers of the climate and environmental emergencies

Ethnobotanical knowledge is vastly under-documented in northwestern South America

A main objective of ethnobotany is to document traditional knowledge about plants before it disappears. However, little is known about the coverage of past ethnobotanical studies and thus about how well the existing literature covers the overall traditional knowledge of different human groups. To bridge this gap, we investigated ethnobotanical data-collecting efforts across four countries (Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Bolivia), three ecoregions (Amazon, Andes, Chocó), and several human groups (including Amerindians, mestizos, and Afro-Americans). We used palms (Arecaceae) as our model group because of their usefulness and pervasiveness in the ethnobotanical literature. We carried out a large number of field interviews (n = 2201) to determine the coverage and quality of palm ethnobotanical data in the existing ethnobotanical literature (n = 255) published over the past 60 years. In our fieldwork in 68 communities, we collected 87,886 use reports and documented 2262 different palm uses and 140 useful palm species. We demonstrate that traditional knowledge on palm uses is vastly under-documented across ecoregions, countries, and human groups. We suggest that the use of standardized data-collecting protocols in wide-ranging ethnobotanical fieldwork is a promising approach for filling critical information gaps. Our work contributes to the Aichi Biodiversity Targets and emphasizes the need for signatory nations to the Convention on Biological Diversity to respond to these information gaps. Given our findings, we hope to stimulate the formulation of clear plans to systematically document ethnobotanical knowledge in northwestern South America and elsewhere before it vanishesThis study was funded by the European Union, 7th Framework Programme (contract no. 212631), the Russel E. Train Education for Nature Program of the WWF (to NPZ), the Anne S. Chatham fellowship of the Garden Club of America (to NPZ), and the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid travel grants programme (to RCL

Unlocking plant resources to support food security and promote sustainable agriculture

As the world's population is increasing, humanity is facing both shortages (hunger) and excesses (obesity) of calorie and nutrient intakes. Biodiversity is fundamental to addressing this double challenge, which involves a far better understanding of the global state of food resources. Current estimates suggest that there are at least 7,039 edible plant species, in a broad taxonomic sense, which includes 7,014 vascular plants. This is in striking contrast to the small handful of food crops that provide the majority of humanity's calorie and nutrient intake. Most of these 7,039 edible species have additional uses, the most common being medicines (70%), materials (59%), and environmental uses (40%). Species of major food crops display centers of diversity, as previously proposed, while the rest of edible plants follow latitudinal distribution patterns similarly to the total plant diversity, with higher species richness at lower latitudes. The International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List includes global conservation assessments for at least 30% of edible plants, with ca. 86% of them conserved ex situ. However, at least 11% of those species recorded are threatened. We highlight multipurpose NUS of plants from different regions of the world, which could be key for a more resilient, sustainable, biodiverse, and community participation-driven new “green revolution.” Furthermore, we explore how fungi could diversify and increase the nutritional value of our diets. NUS, along with the wealth of traditional knowledge about their uses and practices, offer a largely untapped resource to support food security and sustainable agriculture. However, for these natural resources to be unlocked, enhanced collaboration among stakeholders is vital

Language extinction triggers the loss of unique medicinal knowledge

There are nearly 7,400 languages in the world and over 30% of these will no longer be spoken by the end of the century1. So far, however, our understanding of whether language extinction may result in the loss of linguistically-unique knowledge remains limited. Here, we ask to what degree indigenous knowledge of medicinal plants is associated to individual languages and quantify how much indigenous knowledge may vanish as languages and plants go extinct. Focussing on three independent re-gions that have a high biocultural diversity —North America, northwest Amazonia, and New Guinea—we show that >75% of all 12,495 medicinal plant services are linguistically-unique, i.e., only known to one language. Whereas most plant species associated with linguistically-unique knowledge are not threatened, most languages that report linguistically-unique knowledge are. Our finding of high uniqueness in indigenous knowledge and strong coupling with threatened languages suggests that language loss will be even more critical to the extinction of medicinal knowledge than biodiversity loss

Etnobotánica cuantitativa de las palmeras en el noroeste sudamericano: un análisis comparativo en Amazonia, Andes y Chocó

Tesis doctoral inédita leída en la Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Facultad de Ciencias, Departamento de Biología. Fecha de lectura: 05-06-2014Esta Tesis Doctoral es el resultado de un trabajo interdisciplinar realizado entre 2010-2014 para documentar y analizar los patrones de utilización y conocimiento tradicional de las palmeras (Arecaceae) en el noroeste sudamericano. El trabajo se basa en datos de campo recopilados durante 18 meses en cuatro países (Colombia, Ecuador, Perú y Bolivia), tres ecorregiones (Amazonía, Andes, Chocó), tres grupos humanos (indígenas, mestizos, afroamericanos), 55 etnias amerindias, 68 comunidades y 2201 informantes. En conjunto se encontraron 140 especies útiles de palmeras, 2262 usos diferentes y 87.886 registros de uso. El doctorando realizó el trabajo de campo en Colombia y Ecuador. En el Capítulo 1 se presenta una introducción general a la diversidad biocultural del noroeste sudamericano y la importancia que tienen las palmeras en la región, y se esbozan los objetivos de cada uno de los seis capítulos que conforman la Tesis Doctoral. En el Capítulo 2 se presenta el protocolo utilizado para la toma de datos etnobotánicos de palmeras y los factores socioeconómicos de los informantes. En el Capítulo 3 se utilizan todos los datos recopilados en el trabajo de campo para comparar y validar la calidad y cobertura del conocimiento etnobotánico a partir de una revisión bibliográfica de los usos de las palmeras publicados en los últimos 60 años en la misma región. Los resultados de este estudio muestran que el trabajo de campo recopila más información que la literatura existente en la mayoría de las escalas analizadas, y representa la primera evidencia empírica de que el conocimiento etnobotánico está muy poco documentado en el noroeste sudamericano. A la luz de nuestros resultados, esperamos estimular la formulación de planes de trabajo para documentar sistemáticamente el conocimiento etnobotánico en el noroeste sudamericano y en otros lugares antes de que desaparezca. En el Capítulo 4 se analizan los datos etnobotánicos de 15 localidades junto con datos ecológicos de palmeras obtenidos por investigadores de la Universidad de Aarhus en 197 transectos de 0,25 ha, para evaluar por primera vez los servicios ecosistémicos que proporcionan las palmeras a múltiples escalas en el noroeste sudamericano. Los resultados muestran que a pesar de que existe una alta variación geográfica en el conocimiento tradicional, solo unas pocas especies son de gran importancia en la mayoría de las localidades. En general, la utilidad de las palmeras se correlacionó significativamente con la altura del tallo y el diámetro del fruto, pero no fue así con su abundancia. El valor de uso del bosque fue mayor en el noroeste amazónico y en los bosques inundables. Las tres formas de crecimiento de palmeras grandes y de tallos altos, hojas grandes y tallos medianos-bajos y pequeñas fueron las más utilizadas. Las categorías de Alimentación humana y Construcción tuvieron la mayor contribución al valor de uso de los bosques. En el Capítulo 5 se analiza la distribución geográfica del conocimiento tradicional a partir de los usos medicinales de las palmeras en el noroeste sudamericano. Se compara el conocimiento en cuatro países, 52 etnias amerindias, seis grupos no amerindios y 41 comunidades con más de 10 informantes pertenecientes a la misma etnia. El trabajo se basa en datos de campo y bibliografía. La mayoría de los conocimientos sobre usos medicinales no se comparten en las distintas escalas estudiadas. Sin embargo, una minoría importante de este conocimiento sí es ampliamente compartido. Los resultados de este estudio tienen importantes implicaciones para establecer mecanismos multilaterales en la distribución de los (posibles) beneficios que se están contemplando por las partes sudamericanas que suscriben el Protocolo de Nagoya, y para el diseño de protocolos sobre derechos de propiedad intelectual. En el capítulo 6 se analiza la congruencia entre las percepciones de la población local y los resultados derivados de los estudios científicos para determinar si el conocimiento tradicional puede informar a los conservacionistas sobre cambios bioculturales en la región del Chocó. Se realizaron entrevistas con 226 informantes Afrocolombianos, Emberá y Tsa'chila en cinco comunidades, y se inventariaron 19 transectos cerca de la comunidad Afrocolombiana y nueve cerca de las comunidades Tsa'chila. Aunque se han documentado altos niveles de conocimiento tradicional en el Chocó, una gran parte ya no se practica o transmite. Existen diferencias considerables, entre las generaciones jóvenes y mayores, en las percepciones sobre los cambios en la abundancia de las especies de palmeras en los últimos 10 años. Estos resultados indican que es importante considerar e incorporar el conocimiento tradicional de las generaciones de mayor edad para comprender mejor los cambios que tienen lugar en el Chocó, ya que las percepciones de las generaciones más jóvenes son menos fiables. En el Capítulo 7 se presenta la descripción de una de las dos especies de palmeras del género Bactris que se colectaron durante el trabajo de campo en el Chocó de Colombia y que resultaron ser nuevas para la ciencia. Finalmente, en el Capítulo 8 se resumen las principales conclusiones de la Tesis DoctoralThis Doctoral Thesis is the result of an interdisciplinary work between 2010-2014 to document and analyze the use patterns and traditional knowledge of palms (Arecaceae) in northwestern South America. The work is based on field data collected over 18 months in four countries (Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Bolivia), three ecoregions (Amazon, Andes, Chocó), three human groups (indigenous, mestizos, afro-americans), 55 Amerindian groups, 68 communities and 2201 informants. Altogether, 140 useful palm species, 2262 different uses and 87,886 use records were found. The Doctoral student conducted fieldwork in Colombia and Ecuador. Chapter 1 presents a general introduction to the biocultural diversity of northwestern South America, the importance of palms in the region, and the aims of each of the six chapters of the Doctoral Thesis. The protocol used for gathering palm ethnobotanical data and socioeconomic factors of informants is presented in Chapter 2. In Chapter 3, the field data were used to compare and validate the quality and coverage of palm ethnobotanical information from a literature review of works published over the last 60 years in the same region. The results of this study show that fieldwork collected more information than the existing literature on most of the analyzed scales, and represents the first empirical evidence that ethnobotanical knowledge is poorly documented in northwestern South America. Given our findings, we hope to stimulate the formulation of plans to systematically document ethnobotanical knowledge in northwestern South America and elsewhere before it disappears. Chapter 4 presents the first multiple-scale assessment of the ecosystem services provided by palms in northwestern South America. It is based on ethnobotanical data from 15 localities and palm ecological data obtained by researchers at the University of Aarhus in 197 transects of 0.25 ha. The results show that despite high geographical variation in traditional knowledge, only a few species are of great importance in most localities. In general, the utility of palms was significantly correlated with stem height and fruit diameter, but not with abundance. Forest usefulness peaked in the northwest Amazon and in floodplain forests. Three growth forms were the most useful: large tall-stemmed, large leaved and medium-short stemmed, and small palms. The categories of Human food and Construction had the highest contribution to the use value of forests. In Chapter 5 the geographical distribution of traditional knowledge is investigated using field data and bibliographic information about the medicinal uses of palms in northwestern South America. Comparisons are made across four countries, 52 Amerindian groups, six non-Amerindian groups and 41 communities with more than 10 informants belonging to the same ethnic group. On any given scale, most knowledge about medicinal uses is not shared. However, a significant minority of knowledge is widely shared. The results of this study have important implications for the multilateral benefitsharing mechanisms being developed by the South American parties signing the Nagoya Protocol, and for the design of protocols on intellectual property rights. In Chapter 6, an analysis is made of the congruence between the perceptions of local people and the results from scientific studies in order to determine if traditional knowledge can inform conservationists about biocultural change in the Chocó. Overall, 226 interviews were made with Afrocolombian, Emberá and Tsa'chila informants in five communities and 19 transects were inventoried near the Afro-colombian community and nine near the Tsa'chila communities. Although there are high levels of traditional knowledge in the Chocó, a large portion of this knowledge is no longer being practiced or transmitted. There are considerable differences between younger and older generations in perceptions about changes in the abundance of palm species over the last 10 years. These results indicate that it is important to consider and incorporate the traditional knowledge of older generations to better understand the changes taking place in the Chocó, since the perceptions of the younger generations are less reliable. The description of one of the two species of the genus Bactris that were collected during fieldwork in the Choco of Colombia and that were new to science is presented in Chapter 7. Finally, Chapter 8 summarizes the main conclusions of the Doctoral Thesi

World Checklist of Useful Plant Species 2020

Plants are essential to human wellbeing, supporting important ecosystem services that are critical components of Natural Capital. They supply food, medicine, fibre, fuel and building materials, and provide a broad spectrum of benefits to society, offering vital solutions to some of the world’s major challenges, including bioenergy, human and animal health, nutrition, microbial resistance, industrial biotechnology, and synthetic biology. In 2016, the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew published the first State of the World's Plants report, with key statistics on plants. One of its highlights was the compilation of a list of 31,128 plant species with a documented human use from ten datasets (Diazgranados et al. 2018; RBG Kew 2016). Here, we added the datasets from the Medicinal Plant Names Services (MPNS version 8.2), the Plant Resources of South-East Asia (PROSEA) and the Useful Plants of New Guinea, for a total of 13 large datasets. The resulting checklist contains 40,292 species, including nine non-plant taxa retained because they are frequently misidentified as plants (e.g. nostoc, forkweed, brown algae). The checklist is classified into three kingdoms (Plantae with 40,283 species, Chromista with eight species, and Bacteria with one species), six divisions/phyla, 14 classes, 101 orders, 433 families and 6,737 genera. The nomenclature of the species follows the International Plant Names Index (IPNI: 40,239 names with Life Sciences Identifier - LSID), with a few exceptions for taxa not present in it, for which AlgaeBase (30 names) and Tropicos (23 names) were used. The family classification follows the World Checklist of Vascular Plants (v.2.0) and Plants of the World Online (POWO). For higher taxonomy, the taxonomic backbone of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) was used. The classification of uses is based on a modified version of the Economic Botany Data Collections Standard with ten Level 1 categories: medicines (26,662 species), materials (13,663), environmental uses (8,983), human food (7,039), gene sources (5,212), animal food (4,433), poisons (3,013) social uses (2,596), fuels (2,529) and invertebrate food (1,041). The five most diverse families are Fabaceae (3,547 species), Asteraceae (2,367), Poaceae (2,024), Rubiaceae (1,352), and Euphorbiaceae (1,120). With at least 328 species with reported uses, Solanum is the richest genus, followed by Ficus (308), Euphorbia (287), Digitaria (246) and Syzygium (193). Ninety-one families and 2,790 genera have only one species reported, and 70 species have use reports in all ten categories. The final checklist includes the following information: kingdoms, divisions/phyla, classes, orders, families, genera and species names (with publication authors); LSID numbers; categories of use reported for each species; if considered a crop wild relative; and main sources for the information for most cases. Suggested citation: Diazgranados, M., Allkin, B., Black N., Cámara-Leret, R., Canteiro C., Carretero J., Eastwood R., Hargreaves S., Hudson A., Milliken W., Nesbitt, M., Ondo, I., Patmore, K., Pironon, S., Turner, R., Ulian, T. (2020). World Checklist of Useful Plant Species. Produced by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. Knowledge Network for Biocomplexity

Information gaps in indigenous and local knowledge for science-policy assessments

The need to understand nature’s contributions to people and across a broad spectrum of cultures and ecosystems is increasingly advocated in science assessments and policy decision-making for sustainability. However, for services such as food and medicine, gaps in existing studies on indigenous and local knowledge may preclude inclusive assessments. Here, using a large database of indigenous and local knowledge about plant services for New Guinea, we show that there are biological and cultural documentation gaps that will exclude many plant services and indigenous groups from assessments that are based solely on published research. Further, we unveil that, like the common property of ‘rarity’ in species assemblages, most plant services exhibit high rarity. Gaps and rarity are probably pervasive in other regions and will affect how plant services are conceptualized, assessed and sustainably managed