European Red List of Vascular Plants - European Commission

1.3 Species threat status
The conservation status of plants and animals is one
of the most widely used indicators for assessing the
condition of ecosystems and their biodiversity. It also
provides an important tool in establishing priorities
for species conservation. At the global scale, the best
source of information on the conservation status of
plants and animals is the IUCN Red List of Threatened
Species (see www.iucnredlist.org; IUCN 2011). The
Red List is designed to determine the relative risk of
extinction, with the main purpose of cataloguing and
highlighting those taxa that are facing a higher risk
of extinction. It provides taxonomic, conservation
status, and distribution information on taxa that have
been evaluated using the IUCN Red List Categories
and Criteria: Version 3.1 (IUCN 2001). There are nine
Categories, ranging from Least Concern, for species
that are not threatened, to the Extinct category, for
species that have disappeared from the planet 2 . The
IUCN Red List Categories are based on a set of
quantitative criteria linked to population trends,
population size and structure, and geographic range.
Species classified as Vulnerable, Endangered and
Critically Endangered are considered as ‘threatened’.
When conducting regional or national assessments,
two additional categories are used: Regionally Extinct,
and Not Applicable for non-native species (IUCN
2003) (Figure 2).
The IUCN Red List is intended to be policy-relevant,
and it can be used to inform conservation planning
and priority setting processes, but it is not intended to
be policy-prescriptive, and it is not in itself a system for
setting biodiversity conservation priorities.
1.4 Objectives of the assessment
The European regional assessment has four main
objectives:
■■ To contribute to regional conservation planning
through provision of a baseline dataset reporting the
status of European vascular plants.
■■ To identify those geographic areas and habitats needing
to be conserved to prevent extinctions and to ensure
that European vascular plants reach and maintain a
favourable conservation status.
■■ To identify the major threats and to propose mitigating
measures and conservation actions to address them.
■■ To strengthen the network of experts focused on
conservation of vascular plants in Europe so that
the assessment information can be kept current
and expertise can be targeted to address the highest
conservation priorities.
Figure 2. IUCN Red List Categories at regional scale
2 For a description of each of the global IUCN Red List Categories go to: http://www.iucnredlist.org/technical-documents/categories-and-criteria/2001-
categories-criteria#categories
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