The IUCN Red List of Ecosystems provides a global framework for assessing the risk of collapse for ecosystems and represents an additional tool to support resource use and conservation planning decisions. This methodology is based on a similar framework to the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species and provides a consistent, standardised approach for ecosystems.
This framework has been used to estimate the vulnerability of coral reef ecosystem collapse in the Western Indian Ocean (WIO) by Obura, et al. 2022.
CORDIO East Africa has received funding from the MSC Foundation to undertake an extension of IUCN's Red List of Ecosystems (RLE) framework to apply to coral reef regions globally. The initiative includes setting up data sharing standards for an online data repository and an accessible online code repository (based on the Western Indian Ocean (WIO) RLE regional assessment) to support GCRMN nodes in implementing regional RLE analysis.
One of the key elements of this project is to partner with IUCN and contribute to global, regional, and potentially national coral reef RLE assessments by improving data management and fostering collaborative ecosystem assessments.
This project has produced a code repository for replicating the WIO regional RLE analysis using the R statistical programming language. The repository contains a step-by-step guide for the analysis (integrate.R) and includes simulated data for the WIO region to demonstrate the use of the code.
A brief guide to the analysis can be found in the wiki.
Any comments or suggestions for improvement are very much appreciated!