Impending extinction crisis of the world's primates: Why primates matter.

• Type of Material: Article
• Authors: Alejandro Estrada, National Autonomous University of Mexico; Paul A. Garber, University of Illinois; Anthony B. Rylands, Conservation International; Christian Roos, Leibniz Institute for Primate Research; Eduardo Fernandez-Duque, Yale University; Anthony Di Fiore, University of Texas, Austin; K. Anne-Isola Nekaris, Oxford Brookes University; Vincent Nijman, Oxford Brookes University; Eckhard W. Heymann, Leibniz-Institut für Primatenforschung; Joanna E. Lambert, University of Colorado at Boulder; Francesco Rovero, MUSE—Museo delle Scienze; Claudia Barelli, MUSE—Museo delle Scienze; Joanna M. Setchell, Durham University; Thomas Gillespie, Emory University; Russell A. Mittermeier, Conservation International; Luis Verde Arregoitia, Naturhistorisches Museum Bern; Miguel de Guinea, Oxford Brookes University; Sidney Gouveia, Federal University of Sergipe; Ricardo Dobrovolski, Federal University of Bahia; Sam Shanee, Neotropical Primate Conservation; Noga Shanee, Neotropical Primate Conservation; Sarah A. Boyle, Rhodes College; Agustin Fuentes, University of Notre Dame; Katherine C. MacKinnon, Saint Louis University; Katherine R. Amato, Northwestern University; Andreas L.S. Meyer, Universidade Federal do Paraná; Serge Wich, Liverpool John Moores University; Robert W. Sussman, Washington University; Ruliang Pan, University of Western Australia; Inza Kone, Université de Cocody; Baoguo Li, Northwest University
• Language: English
• Date: 2017-01
• Publisher: American Association for the Advancement of Science: Science Advances
• Publication Version: Final Published Version
• Copyright Statement: © 2017, The Authors
• License: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International
• Final Published Version (URL): http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/3/1/e1600946
• Title of Journal or Parent Work: Science Advances
• ISSN: 2375-2548
• Volume: 3
• Issue: 1
• Start Page: e1600946
• End Page: e1600946
• Grant/Funding Information: However, S.G. and R.D. acknowledge the support of CNPq and of CAPES, FAPESB, CNPq (process 461665/2014-0), and PRODOC/UFBA (process 5849/2013), respectively.; No funding was used to support the writing of this review paper.
• Keywords: rural livelihoods; deforestation; industrial agriculture; hunting; primate conservation; sustainable land use; nonhuman primates; ecosystem health; illegal trade; tropical forests
• Research Categories: Environmental Sciences; Biology, General; Anthropology, Physical

Abstract

Nonhuman primates, our closest biological relatives, play important roles in the livelihoods, cultures, and religions of many societies and offer unique insights into human evolution, biology, behavior, and the threat of emerging diseases. They are an essential component of tropical biodiversity, contributing to forest regeneration and ecosystem health. Current information shows the existence of 504 species in 79 genera distributed in the Neotropics, mainland Africa, Madagascar, and Asia. Alarmingly, ~60% of primate species are now threatened with extinction and ~75% have declining populations. This situation is the result of escalating anthropogenic pressures on primates and their habitats-mainly global and local market demands, leading to extensive habitat loss through the expansion of industrial agriculture, large-scale cattle ranching, logging, oil and gas drilling, mining, dam building, and the construction of new road networks in primate range regions. Other important drivers are increased bushmeat hunting and the illegal trade of primates as pets and primate body parts, along with emerging threats, such as climate change and anthroponotic diseases. Often, these pressures act in synergy, exacerbating primate population declines. Given that primate range regions overlap extensively with a large, and rapidly growing, human population characterized by high levels of poverty, global attention is needed immediately to reverse the looming risk of primate extinctions and to attend to local human needs in sustainable ways. Raising global scientific and public awareness of the plight of the world's primates and the costs of their loss to ecosystem health and human society is imperative.