PATTERNS OF AFRICAN PRIMATE DIVERSITY AND THEIR EVALUATION FOR THE SELECTION OF CONSERVATION AREAS

This study evaluates spatial patterns of primate diversity and their i mplications for conservation area-selection in continental Africa and Madagascar. Each cell in a 1 degrees latitude-longitude grid is scored for taxon richness, character richness, rarity-weighted richness (end emism), and threatened taxon richness. The spatial patterns of these m easures are plotted and compared. Hotspots of taxon richness and threa tened taxon richness are clustered and show a high degree of congruenc e, but endemic hotspots are scattered and show little coincidence with either. The efficiency of area-selection through complementarity is d emonstrated and the influence of the conservation status of the target taxa on that efficiency is investigated. Complementary areas selected on the basis of threatened taxa tend to capture a greater proportion of total taxon richness than areas selected on a more indiscriminate b asis. At a finer spatial scale, local sites of high primate taxon rich ness are similarly shown to contain a greater proportion of threatened taxa and possess threatened taxa of higher conservation status. These results suggest that the protection of areas containing threatened ta xa will also lead to the protection of areas of high taxon richness am ong African primates. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserv ed.