posts: 41955
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| 41955 | Elephants, rhinos, gorillas: how many of our largest mammals are at risk of extinction? | untitled-reusable-block-268 | wp_block | publish | <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Since humans arrived, it has been the largest mammals that have been most threatened with extinction. In fact, our hunter-gatherer ancestors drove more than 178 megafauna species to extinction millennia ago. As we discuss in detail in our related article, not only do we have a bias towards large mammals when hunting, these large animals are also much slower to reproduce. This means their populations can decline very quickly.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Let’s then focus on the largest mammals we have today. If we can identify which ones are at-risk; what the pressures are; and where this is happening we can take action to protect them.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>In a paper published in <em>Science</em>,<em> </em>a team of researchers looked at the threats to 74 of the world’s largest mammalian <em>herbivore</em> species – animals that typically eat only plants.{ref}Ripple, W. J., Newsome, T. M., Wolf, C., Dirzo, R., Everatt, K. T., Galetti, M., ... & Van Valkenburgh, B. (2015). <a href="https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/1/4/e1400103">Collapse of the world’s largest herbivores</a>. <em>Science Advances</em>, <em>1</em>(4), e1400103.{/ref} They all weighed more than 100 kilograms. This included families such as elephants, rhinos, hippos, deer, gorillas and bison.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>William Ripple and colleagues (2015) found that 60% of the largest herbivores are threatened with extinction; most of them from poaching for meat, medicines or body parts, or from habitat loss; and the majority are in Africa or Asia.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:heading {"level":4} --> <h4>60% of the world’s largest herbivores are threatened with extinction</h4> <!-- /wp:heading --> <!-- wp:columns --> <div class="wp-block-columns"><!-- wp:column --> <div class="wp-block-column"><!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>In the chart we see each family of species categorized by their extinction risk. The IUCN Red List quantifies the extinction risk of these categories in the following way:</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:list --> <ul><li><em>Critically endangered</em> species have a probability of extinction higher than 50% in ten years or three generations;</li><li><em>Endangered species</em> have a greater than 20% probability in 20 years or five generations;</li><li><em>Vulnerable</em> have a probability greater than 10% over a century.</li></ul> <!-- /wp:list --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Let’s take gorillas as an example. There are two gorilla species of – the Western and Eastern gorilla. The Western gorilla is classified as ‘critically endangered’; the Eastern gorilla is under slightly less pressure, but is still worryingly classified as 'endangered'.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Or rhinos, where the glamorisation of their horns have put them under intense pressure. There are five species of rhino: the White; Black; Javan; Indian and Sumatran Rhinoceros. All species, except the White Rhino are threatened with extinction and have very small populations. Even then, it is only one subset of species – the <em>Southern</em> White Rhino – which is doing well. <em>Northern</em> White Rhinos are on the brink of extinction. There are only two left, and both of them are female. Our only hope of saving them is to <a href="https://www.newscientist.com/article/2264951-embryos-set-to-be-implanted-in-the-last-two-northern-white-rhinos/">implant them with an embryo</a> and hope that they reproduce [scientists are planning to do this before 2022]. We take a closer look at rhino populations <strong><a href="http://ourworldindata.org/mammals#rhinos">here</a></strong>.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>What’s striking is that most large mammals are threatened to some extent.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --></div> <!-- /wp:column --> <!-- wp:column --> <div class="wp-block-column"><!-- wp:image {"id":41951,"sizeSlug":"full","linkDestination":"none"} --> <figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img src="https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction.png" alt="" class="wp-image-41951"/></figure> <!-- /wp:image --></div> <!-- /wp:column --></div> <!-- /wp:columns --> <!-- wp:heading {"level":4} --> <h4>Hunting, livestock and habitat loss are the biggest threats to mammals</h4> <!-- /wp:heading --> <!-- wp:columns --> <div class="wp-block-columns"><!-- wp:column --> <div class="wp-block-column"><!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>What is driving some of our favourite animals towards extinction?</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>The largest threats are shown in the chart. Poaching is the biggest by far. More than 70% of large herbivores are exploited for their meat, and almost 30% for body parts. Many are hunted for both. Elephants are hunted for their skin, trunks and ivory; rhinos for their horns; pigs, zebra, and buffalo for their meat; and gorillas for their feet and hands as trophies.{ref}Sampson, C., McEvoy, J., Oo, Z. M., Chit, A. M., Chan, A. N., Tonkyn, D., ... & Leimgruber, P. (2018). <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0194113">New elephant crisis in Asia—Early warning signs from Myanmar</a>. <em>PLoS One</em>, <em>13</em>(3), e0194113.<br><br>Haurez, B., Petre, C. A., & Doucet, J. L. (2013). <a href="https://orbi.uliege.be/handle/2268/152211">Impacts of logging and hunting on western lowland gorilla (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) populations and consequences for forest regeneration. A review</a>. <em>Biotechnologie, agronomie, société et environnement</em>, <em>17</em>(2), 364-372.{/ref} </p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Hunting is obviously not a new threat to large mammals: humans have a long history of driving species to extinction through exploitation. But, today we have the means to stop it.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>The other major threat is agriculture – first in terms of livestock competition and the diseases they bring, and also in terms of habitat loss. Globally we use <a href="https://ourworldindata.org/global-land-for-agriculture">half of all habitable land</a> for agriculture. This expansion of pasture and cropland has come at the cost of forests and wild grasslands, and has fragmented habitats that these species rely on. If we want to protect our large mammal species we need to make more land available for wildlife that is free from human encroachment. This means bringing deforestation to an end; reducing cropland expansion through improved yields; and reducing the amount of land we use for pasture so wild animals and livestock are not in conflict.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --></div> <!-- /wp:column --> <!-- wp:column --> <div class="wp-block-column"><!-- wp:image {"id":41953,"sizeSlug":"full","linkDestination":"none"} --> <figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img src="https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/What-are-the-largest-threats-to-large-mammals.png" alt="" class="wp-image-41953"/></figure> <!-- /wp:image --></div> <!-- /wp:column --></div> <!-- /wp:columns --> <!-- wp:heading {"level":4} --> <h4>Most threatened mammals are in Africa and Asia</h4> <!-- /wp:heading --> <!-- wp:columns --> <div class="wp-block-columns"><!-- wp:column --> <div class="wp-block-column"><!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Humans had wiped out most large mammals in the Americas shortly after their arrival around 10 to 15,000 years ago. 83% of North, and 72% of South America’s megafauna (mammals weighing more than 40 kilograms) went extinct.{ref}Barnosky, A. D. (2008). <a href="https://www.pnas.org/content/105/Supplement_1/11543">Megafauna biomass tradeoff as a driver of Quaternary and future extinctions</a>. <em>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</em>, <em>105</em>(Supplement 1), 11543-11548.{/ref} Today, they are home to much fewer large mammal species. North America has none that are threatened with extinction. However, continued deforestation, livestock competition, and poaching mean that 80% of large herbivore species in Latin America are threatened.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>These threats extend across much of the tropics. Africa and Asia are both home to a large number of threatened species. One factor here is that they are particularly rich in mammal biodiversity. They have a lot of mammal species, and in particular, <a href="https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/endemic-mammal-species-by-country"><em>endemic</em> species</a> which means they occur naturally in only one country. Indonesia has the largest number of unique mammals, with 281 endemic species. It’s home to the last remaining Sumatran and Javan Rhinos. Madagascar is also rich in biodiversity; it has more than 200 endemic mammals.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>So, the tropics are rich in biodiversity. But they’re also where pressures on wildlife are greatest. Illegal wildlife trade – the buying and selling of exotic species – is still booming across many countries in Africa and Asia today. Elephants, rhinos and gorillas are all poached for their body parts, and sold at a lucrative price. It’s not just direct hunting that’s putting these species at risk. As we saw above, habitat loss is also a major problem. 95% of <a href="https://ourworldindata.org/forests-and-deforestation">deforestation today</a> occurs in the tropics. Growing demands for food domestically, and commodities to sell in the global market, have led to continued expansion of land for agriculture.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --> <!-- wp:paragraph --> <p>Protecting the world’s largest mammals means bringing poaching, and deforestation to an end. Nearly all of this action will need to come from countries across the tropics.</p> <!-- /wp:paragraph --></div> <!-- /wp:column --> <!-- wp:column --> <div class="wp-block-column"><!-- wp:image {"id":41954,"sizeSlug":"full","linkDestination":"none"} --> <figure class="wp-block-image size-full"><img src="https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Where-are-largest-mammals-at-risk-of-extinction.png" alt="" class="wp-image-41954"/></figure> <!-- /wp:image --></div> <!-- /wp:column --></div> <!-- /wp:columns --> | {
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"text": "(Supplement 1), 11543-11548.{/ref} Today, they are home to much fewer large mammal species. North America has none that are threatened with extinction. However, continued deforestation, livestock competition, and poaching mean that 80% of large herbivore species in Latin America are threatened.",
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"text": " which means they occur naturally in only one country. Indonesia has the largest number of unique mammals, with 281 endemic species. It\u2019s home to the last remaining Sumatran and Javan Rhinos. Madagascar is also rich in biodiversity; it has more than 200 endemic mammals.",
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"text": "So, the tropics are rich in biodiversity. But they\u2019re also where pressures on wildlife are greatest. Illegal wildlife trade \u2013 the buying and selling of exotic species \u2013 is still booming across many countries in Africa and Asia today. Elephants, rhinos and gorillas are all poached for their body parts, and sold at a lucrative price. It\u2019s not just direct hunting that\u2019s putting these species at risk. As we saw above, habitat loss is also a major problem. 95% of ",
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2021-03-24 15:47:14 | 2022-12-14 13:59:04 | {} |
Since humans arrived, it has been the largest mammals that have been most threatened with extinction. In fact, our hunter-gatherer ancestors drove more than 178 megafauna species to extinction millennia ago. As we discuss in detail in our related article, not only do we have a bias towards large mammals when hunting, these large animals are also much slower to reproduce. This means their populations can decline very quickly. Let’s then focus on the largest mammals we have today. If we can identify which ones are at-risk; what the pressures are; and where this is happening we can take action to protect them. In a paper published in _Science_,_ _a team of researchers looked at the threats to 74 of the world’s largest mammalian _herbivore_ species – animals that typically eat only plants.{ref}Ripple, W. J., Newsome, T. M., Wolf, C., Dirzo, R., Everatt, K. T., Galetti, M., ... & Van Valkenburgh, B. (2015). [Collapse of the world’s largest herbivores](https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/1/4/e1400103). _Science Advances_, _1_(4), e1400103.{/ref} They all weighed more than 100 kilograms. This included families such as elephants, rhinos, hippos, deer, gorillas and bison. William Ripple and colleagues (2015) found that 60% of the largest herbivores are threatened with extinction; most of them from poaching for meat, medicines or body parts, or from habitat loss; and the majority are in Africa or Asia. ## 60% of the world’s largest herbivores are threatened with extinction In the chart we see each family of species categorized by their extinction risk. The IUCN Red List quantifies the extinction risk of these categories in the following way: * _Critically endangered_ species have a probability of extinction higher than 50% in ten years or three generations; * _Endangered species_ have a greater than 20% probability in 20 years or five generations; * _Vulnerable_ have a probability greater than 10% over a century. Let’s take gorillas as an example. There are two gorilla species of – the Western and Eastern gorilla. The Western gorilla is classified as ‘critically endangered’; the Eastern gorilla is under slightly less pressure, but is still worryingly classified as 'endangered'. Or rhinos, where the glamorisation of their horns have put them under intense pressure. There are five species of rhino: the White; Black; Javan; Indian and Sumatran Rhinoceros. All species, except the White Rhino are threatened with extinction and have very small populations. Even then, it is only one subset of species – the _Southern_ White Rhino – which is doing well. _Northern_ White Rhinos are on the brink of extinction. There are only two left, and both of them are female. Our only hope of saving them is to [implant them with an embryo](https://www.newscientist.com/article/2264951-embryos-set-to-be-implanted-in-the-last-two-northern-white-rhinos/) and hope that they reproduce [scientists are planning to do this before 2022]. We take a closer look at rhino populations **[here](http://ourworldindata.org/mammals#rhinos)**. What’s striking is that most large mammals are threatened to some extent. <Image filename="Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction.png" alt=""/> ## Hunting, livestock and habitat loss are the biggest threats to mammals What is driving some of our favourite animals towards extinction? The largest threats are shown in the chart. Poaching is the biggest by far. More than 70% of large herbivores are exploited for their meat, and almost 30% for body parts. Many are hunted for both. Elephants are hunted for their skin, trunks and ivory; rhinos for their horns; pigs, zebra, and buffalo for their meat; and gorillas for their feet and hands as trophies.{ref}Sampson, C., McEvoy, J., Oo, Z. M., Chit, A. M., Chan, A. N., Tonkyn, D., ... & Leimgruber, P. (2018). [New elephant crisis in Asia—Early warning signs from Myanmar](https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0194113). _PLoS One_, _13_(3), e0194113. Haurez, B., Petre, C. A., & Doucet, J. L. (2013). [Impacts of logging and hunting on western lowland gorilla (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) populations and consequences for forest regeneration. A review](https://orbi.uliege.be/handle/2268/152211). _Biotechnologie, agronomie, société et environnement_, _17_(2), 364-372.{/ref} Hunting is obviously not a new threat to large mammals: humans have a long history of driving species to extinction through exploitation. But, today we have the means to stop it. The other major threat is agriculture – first in terms of livestock competition and the diseases they bring, and also in terms of habitat loss. Globally we use [half of all habitable land](https://ourworldindata.org/global-land-for-agriculture) for agriculture. This expansion of pasture and cropland has come at the cost of forests and wild grasslands, and has fragmented habitats that these species rely on. If we want to protect our large mammal species we need to make more land available for wildlife that is free from human encroachment. This means bringing deforestation to an end; reducing cropland expansion through improved yields; and reducing the amount of land we use for pasture so wild animals and livestock are not in conflict. <Image filename="What-are-the-largest-threats-to-large-mammals.png" alt=""/> ## Most threatened mammals are in Africa and Asia Humans had wiped out most large mammals in the Americas shortly after their arrival around 10 to 15,000 years ago. 83% of North, and 72% of South America’s megafauna (mammals weighing more than 40 kilograms) went extinct.{ref}Barnosky, A. D. (2008). [Megafauna biomass tradeoff as a driver of Quaternary and future extinctions](https://www.pnas.org/content/105/Supplement_1/11543). _Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences_, _105_(Supplement 1), 11543-11548.{/ref} Today, they are home to much fewer large mammal species. North America has none that are threatened with extinction. However, continued deforestation, livestock competition, and poaching mean that 80% of large herbivore species in Latin America are threatened. These threats extend across much of the tropics. Africa and Asia are both home to a large number of threatened species. One factor here is that they are particularly rich in mammal biodiversity. They have a lot of mammal species, and in particular, [_endemic_ species](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/endemic-mammal-species-by-country) which means they occur naturally in only one country. Indonesia has the largest number of unique mammals, with 281 endemic species. It’s home to the last remaining Sumatran and Javan Rhinos. Madagascar is also rich in biodiversity; it has more than 200 endemic mammals. So, the tropics are rich in biodiversity. But they’re also where pressures on wildlife are greatest. Illegal wildlife trade – the buying and selling of exotic species – is still booming across many countries in Africa and Asia today. Elephants, rhinos and gorillas are all poached for their body parts, and sold at a lucrative price. It’s not just direct hunting that’s putting these species at risk. As we saw above, habitat loss is also a major problem. 95% of [deforestation today](https://ourworldindata.org/forests-and-deforestation) occurs in the tropics. Growing demands for food domestically, and commodities to sell in the global market, have led to continued expansion of land for agriculture. Protecting the world’s largest mammals means bringing poaching, and deforestation to an end. Nearly all of this action will need to come from countries across the tropics. <Image filename="Where-are-largest-mammals-at-risk-of-extinction.png" alt=""/> | {
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"content": "\n<p>Since humans arrived, it has been the largest mammals that have been most threatened with extinction. In fact, our hunter-gatherer ancestors drove more than 178 megafauna species to extinction millennia ago. As we discuss in detail in our related article, not only do we have a bias towards large mammals when hunting, these large animals are also much slower to reproduce. This means their populations can decline very quickly.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Let\u2019s then focus on the largest mammals we have today. If we can identify which ones are at-risk; what the pressures are; and where this is happening we can take action to protect them.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>In a paper published in <em>Science</em>,<em> </em>a team of researchers looked at the threats to 74 of the world\u2019s largest mammalian <em>herbivore</em> species \u2013 animals that typically eat only plants.{ref}Ripple, W. J., Newsome, T. M., Wolf, C., Dirzo, R., Everatt, K. T., Galetti, M., … & Van Valkenburgh, B. (2015). <a href=\"https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/1/4/e1400103\">Collapse of the world\u2019s largest herbivores</a>. <em>Science Advances</em>, <em>1</em>(4), e1400103.{/ref} They all weighed more than 100 kilograms. This included families such as elephants, rhinos, hippos, deer, gorillas and bison.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>William Ripple and colleagues (2015) found that 60% of the largest herbivores are threatened with extinction; most of them from poaching for meat, medicines or body parts, or from habitat loss; and the majority are in Africa or Asia.</p>\n\n\n\n<h4>60% of the world\u2019s largest herbivores are threatened with extinction</h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column\">\n<p>In the chart we see each family of species categorized by their extinction risk. The IUCN Red List quantifies the extinction risk of these categories in the following way:</p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li><em>Critically endangered</em> species have a probability of extinction higher than 50% in ten years or three generations;</li><li><em>Endangered species</em> have a greater than 20% probability in 20 years or five generations;</li><li><em>Vulnerable</em> have a probability greater than 10% over a century.</li></ul>\n\n\n\n<p>Let\u2019s take gorillas as an example. There are two gorilla species of \u2013 the Western and Eastern gorilla. The Western gorilla is classified as \u2018critically endangered\u2019; the Eastern gorilla is under slightly less pressure, but is still worryingly classified as ‘endangered’.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Or rhinos, where the glamorisation of their horns have put them under intense pressure. There are five species of rhino: the White; Black; Javan; Indian and Sumatran Rhinoceros. All species, except the White Rhino are threatened with extinction and have very small populations. Even then, it is only one subset of species \u2013 the <em>Southern</em> White Rhino \u2013 which is doing well. <em>Northern</em> White Rhinos are on the brink of extinction. There are only two left, and both of them are female. Our only hope of saving them is to <a href=\"https://www.newscientist.com/article/2264951-embryos-set-to-be-implanted-in-the-last-two-northern-white-rhinos/\">implant them with an embryo</a> and hope that they reproduce [scientists are planning to do this before 2022]. We take a closer look at rhino populations <strong><a href=\"http://ourworldindata.org/mammals#rhinos\">here</a></strong>.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>What\u2019s striking is that most large mammals are threatened to some extent.</p>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"2482\" height=\"2125\" src=\"https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-41951\" srcset=\"https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction.png 2482w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction-400x342.png 400w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction-642x550.png 642w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction-150x128.png 150w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction-768x658.png 768w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction-1536x1315.png 1536w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Which-of-our-large-mammals-are-at-risk-of-extinction-2048x1753.png 2048w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 2482px) 100vw, 2482px\" /></figure>\n</div>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<h4>Hunting, livestock and habitat loss are the biggest threats to mammals</h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column\">\n<p>What is driving some of our favourite animals towards extinction?</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The largest threats are shown in the chart. Poaching is the biggest by far. More than 70% of large herbivores are exploited for their meat, and almost 30% for body parts. Many are hunted for both. Elephants are hunted for their skin, trunks and ivory; rhinos for their horns; pigs, zebra, and buffalo for their meat; and gorillas for their feet and hands as trophies.{ref}Sampson, C., McEvoy, J., Oo, Z. M., Chit, A. M., Chan, A. N., Tonkyn, D., … & Leimgruber, P. (2018). <a href=\"https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0194113\">New elephant crisis in Asia\u2014Early warning signs from Myanmar</a>. <em>PLoS One</em>, <em>13</em>(3), e0194113.<br><br>Haurez, B., Petre, C. A., & Doucet, J. L. (2013). <a href=\"https://orbi.uliege.be/handle/2268/152211\">Impacts of logging and hunting on western lowland gorilla (Gorilla gorilla gorilla) populations and consequences for forest regeneration. A review</a>. <em>Biotechnologie, agronomie, soci\u00e9t\u00e9 et environnement</em>, <em>17</em>(2), 364-372.{/ref} </p>\n\n\n\n<p>Hunting is obviously not a new threat to large mammals: humans have a long history of driving species to extinction through exploitation. But, today we have the means to stop it.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>The other major threat is agriculture \u2013 first in terms of livestock competition and the diseases they bring, and also in terms of habitat loss. Globally we use <a href=\"https://ourworldindata.org/global-land-for-agriculture\">half of all habitable land</a> for agriculture. This expansion of pasture and cropland has come at the cost of forests and wild grasslands, and has fragmented habitats that these species rely on. If we want to protect our large mammal species we need to make more land available for wildlife that is free from human encroachment. This means bringing deforestation to an end; reducing cropland expansion through improved yields; and reducing the amount of land we use for pasture so wild animals and livestock are not in conflict.</p>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1283\" height=\"1222\" src=\"https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/What-are-the-largest-threats-to-large-mammals.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-41953\" srcset=\"https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/What-are-the-largest-threats-to-large-mammals.png 1283w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/What-are-the-largest-threats-to-large-mammals-400x381.png 400w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/What-are-the-largest-threats-to-large-mammals-577x550.png 577w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/What-are-the-largest-threats-to-large-mammals-150x143.png 150w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/What-are-the-largest-threats-to-large-mammals-768x731.png 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1283px) 100vw, 1283px\" /></figure>\n</div>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<h4>Most threatened mammals are in Africa and Asia</h4>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-columns\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-column\">\n<p>Humans had wiped out most large mammals in the Americas shortly after their arrival around 10 to 15,000 years ago. 83% of North, and 72% of South America\u2019s megafauna (mammals weighing more than 40 kilograms) went extinct.{ref}Barnosky, A. D. (2008). <a href=\"https://www.pnas.org/content/105/Supplement_1/11543\">Megafauna biomass tradeoff as a driver of Quaternary and future extinctions</a>. <em>Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences</em>, <em>105</em>(Supplement 1), 11543-11548.{/ref} Today, they are home to much fewer large mammal species. North America has none that are threatened with extinction. However, continued deforestation, livestock competition, and poaching mean that 80% of large herbivore species in Latin America are threatened.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>These threats extend across much of the tropics. Africa and Asia are both home to a large number of threatened species. One factor here is that they are particularly rich in mammal biodiversity. They have a lot of mammal species, and in particular, <a href=\"https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/endemic-mammal-species-by-country\"><em>endemic</em> species</a> which means they occur naturally in only one country. Indonesia has the largest number of unique mammals, with 281 endemic species. It\u2019s home to the last remaining Sumatran and Javan Rhinos. Madagascar is also rich in biodiversity; it has more than 200 endemic mammals.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>So, the tropics are rich in biodiversity. But they\u2019re also where pressures on wildlife are greatest. Illegal wildlife trade \u2013 the buying and selling of exotic species \u2013 is still booming across many countries in Africa and Asia today. Elephants, rhinos and gorillas are all poached for their body parts, and sold at a lucrative price. It\u2019s not just direct hunting that\u2019s putting these species at risk. As we saw above, habitat loss is also a major problem. 95% of <a href=\"https://ourworldindata.org/forests-and-deforestation\">deforestation today</a> occurs in the tropics. Growing demands for food domestically, and commodities to sell in the global market, have led to continued expansion of land for agriculture.</p>\n\n\n\n<p>Protecting the world\u2019s largest mammals means bringing poaching, and deforestation to an end. Nearly all of this action will need to come from countries across the tropics.</p>\n</div>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-column\">\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-full\"><img loading=\"lazy\" width=\"1325\" height=\"1224\" src=\"https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Where-are-largest-mammals-at-risk-of-extinction.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-41954\" srcset=\"https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Where-are-largest-mammals-at-risk-of-extinction.png 1325w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Where-are-largest-mammals-at-risk-of-extinction-400x370.png 400w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Where-are-largest-mammals-at-risk-of-extinction-595x550.png 595w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Where-are-largest-mammals-at-risk-of-extinction-150x139.png 150w, https://owid.cloud/app/uploads/2021/03/Where-are-largest-mammals-at-risk-of-extinction-768x709.png 768w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1325px) 100vw, 1325px\" /></figure>\n</div>\n</div>\n"
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