If we then compare the
IUCN range maps to the MCPs (using the habitat-filtered maps, as these
can be as small as 8% (B. dahlbomii, P. onca) of the largest
MCPs), we find large areas of commission error (mapped areas that fall
outside species actual ranges due to either wrong points, or unsuitable
habitat within the MCP), highlighting that much of these areas are still
unsuitable (Table 2). Whilst modelling could be used, and would further
refine distributions (i.e. Hughes et al., 2021c), these steps highlight
that even if data were adequately cleaned, the final outcomes would
still not be indicative of species ranges; at a minimum, a habitat
filter must be imposed, and coarser filters based on intactness can be
easy to apply (e.g. Lu et al., 2021). Thus, whilst global prioritisation
and ambitious analyses are needed, species-specific models or maps for
many groups, such as insects, are simply not possible globally without
additional efforts to collate data (Garcia-Rosello et al., 2023); such
attempts would simply not be representative of data-poor regions, or
indeed, any biodiversity hotspot (especially if no habitat filter was
implemented). Until data-gaps are filled (as in the case of concerted
work for ants: Kass et al., 2022), meaningful analysis will remain
challenging or even impossible at global scales, and focusing on taxa or
regions where such data are available is necessary.
Table 2. Overlap between IUCN ranges and habitat-filtered MCPs.