Sustainability indices for exploited populations

Evaluating the sustainability of hunting is key to the conservation of spec ies exploited for bushmeat. Researchers are often hampered by a lack of bas ic biological data, the usual response to which is to develop sustainabilit y indices based on highly simplified population models. However, the standa rd indices in the bushmeat literature do not perform well under realistic c onditions of uncertainty, bias in parameter estimation, and habitat loss. A nother possible approach to estimating the sustainability of hunting under uncertainty is to use Bayesian statistics, but this is mathematically deman ding. Red listing of threatened species has to be carried out in extremely data-poor situations: uncertainty has been incorporated into this process i n a relatively simple and intuitive way using fuzzy numbers. The current me thods for estimating sustainability of bushmeat hunting also do not incorpo rate spatial heterogeneity. No-take areas are one management tool that can address uncertainty in a spatially explicit way.