News Published: 29 October 2024

We are back for the 5th episode of the first series of BGCI’s new podcast; The Understory. In this episode we celebrate the amazing work of BGCI’s Global Tree Assessment.  

On 28th October 2024, the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species published it’s second 2024 update which included results from Global Tree Assessment. The update means that now trees are a comprehensively assessed group on the IUCN Red List, with over 80% of global tree diversity assessed for their extinction risk. To celebrate this incredible milestone, we have been speaking to Malin Rivers, Global Tree Assessment Lead at BGCI, and Irene Zager from GTA partner organisation, Provtia.  

Prior to this publication, BGCI published an interim report 2021 – State of the World’s Trees – this was the culmination of 5 years’ work. This weeks IUCN Red List Update builds that success of this work and marks progress for the publication of tree assessments on the IUCN Red List.

“For the first time, the majority of the world’s trees have been listed on the IUCN Red List, revealing that at least 16,425 of the 47,282 species assessed are at risk of extinction.”  

BGCI’s work for tree conservation does not finish with the publication of the Global Tree Assessment, if you want to find out more about our work in this area – then head over to the Tree Conservation Programme section of the website.  

Target Refresh:

In this episode, we mention how the Global Tree Assessment directly contributes to Target 2 of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation goals for 2010-2020. As a reminder, this target calls for “an assessment of the conservation status of all known plant species, as far as possible, to guide conservation action.” In terms of the new Global Biodiversity Framework the Global Tree Assessment, and all extinction risk assessments for plants, contribute to Target 4 of the KMGBF.

Further Reading: 

We know you love some more information, so if you want more information about the methodology and results of GlobalTreeSearch were published in 2017 in the Journal of Sustainable Forestry. (Beech, E., Rivers, M., Oldfield, S., & Smith, P.P. (2017). GlobalTreeSearch: the first complete global database of tree species and country distributions. Journal of Sustainable Forestry, 1-36.)

In 2022, we also published ‘Scientists warning to humanity for tree extinctions‘ which highlights why tree species are essential for life on earth and why we need to save them. (Rivers, M., Newton, A.C., Oldfied, S., & Global Tree Assessment Contributors. (2022). Scientists’ warning to humanity on tree extinctions. Plants, People, Planet, 466-482.)

From the GTA team: 

If you’d like to learn more about this amazing area of work, and particularly the impact of this recent publication, then you can read the news item written by the GTA team, titled; The Global Tree Assessment – Understanding tree status worldwide and inspiring conservation action. 

Thank you so much for supporting our brand-new podcast, we really hope you enjoyed it. Please remember to like, review, and subscribe, and maybe share it with your friends

Thanks, 

Rebecca & Megan 😊 

Other useful links: 

• Want to learn more about the IUCN? Click here 
• Want to learn more about the IUCN Species Survival Commission (SSC)? Click here 
• Want to read the full Press Release regarding the Red List update publication? Click here 
• Want to learn more about the Global Tree Specialist Group? Click here 
• Want to learn more about BGCI’s Red List Publications? Click here 
• Want to learn more Conservation Prioritisation? Click here or read a recent issue of Roots about this subject by clicking here.  
• Want to learn more about GlobalTreeSearch? Click here 
• Want to learn more about ThreatSearch? Click here 
• Want to learn more about GlobalTreePortal? Click here 
• Want to learn more about plant conservation assessments? Click here for the State of the world’s plants and fungi 2023.  
• Want to learn more about our Global Conservation Consortia? Click here 

Credits & Special Thanks: 

A huge thank you to our guests for this episode; Malin Rivers (BGCI) and Irene Zager (Provita).  

Series 1 of BGCI: The Understory Podcast was written and researched by Rebecca Hansell and Megan Barstow, with assistance from Carly Cowell in the first stages of development. This episode was edited by Rebecca Hansell using Audacity, and originally recorded over Zoom. The music is by elemontary-music and the sound effects are by Trading Nation, both were sourced from Pixabay.