Kokubugata & Kato. Combined red lists of East Asian countries/regions and comparison of threatened seed plants between Japan and its adjacent regions

Combined red lists of East Asian countries/regions and comparison of threatened seed plants between Japan and its adjacent regions

Goro KOKUBUGATA & Masahiro KATO
National Museum of Nature and Science, Tsukuba, Japan

A red list has been independently published in each country/region. These red lists are valuable for understanding threatened species in these national and regional areas. On the other hand, global studies and investigations are essential for understanding the biology of threatened species, because national and regional borders are not respected by wild animals and plants. At the last EABGN meeting at Nagoya in 2010, the authors agreed to construct and promote a combined red list of East Asian countries/regions as useful material for discussion and collaborative research on threatened plants in East Asia. Herein, we present the combined red list consisting of threatened seed plants of China, Japan, South Korea, East Russia and Taiwan. Also we numerically compare threatened seed plants between Japan and the four adjacent regions. The number of threatened seed plant taxa (excepting Least Consern and Data Deficient) was 3 824 taxa for China, 1 775 taxa for Japan, 336 taxa for South Korea, 1 056 for East Russia and 1 141 taxa for Taiwan. Orchidaceae are the most threatened taxa in China, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan and Compositae – in East Russia. Out of the five regions, China has the largest number of threatened taxa; while Taiwan has the highest density of threatened taxa. Japan and each of the four countries/regions (China, South Korea, East Russia and Taiwan) share 92 (5.2 % of Japanese threatened taxa), 85 (4.8 %), 72 (4.1 %) and 108 (6.1 %) identical threatened plant taxa. These data indicate that generally the threat to plants is regional. The combined red list of East Asia totals 7 599 taxa (213 families), in which Orchidaceae (1 385 taxa; 18.2 %) are the largest. For further understanding the biology of threatened plants in East Asia, we should: 1) promote global taxonomic studies; and 2) standard categories and criteria under a uniform concept.