Toward a more effective funding model for conservation

The world is on the edge of its sixth mass extinction. To counteract this crisis, we need sufficient knowledge of the current vulnerability status of individual species to understand where priorities for interventions and management lie, as well as to develop more efficient mechanisms to conserve threatened species. Addressing knowledge gaps of the status of species and the threats they face is of paramount importance. Even for the species that have been assessed, the level of information varies, with neglected taxa often represented by generic information, which may fail to capture their true status and their extinction trends. Overall, conservation initiatives remain underfunded. Therefore, given the limited funding available relative to the ever-increasing number of threatened species, using these funds efficiently is essential if we hope to counter the loss of thousands of species in neglected taxa. Developing criteria for funding prioritization that accounts for both threat and knowledge gaps would also help ensure we could address the present taxonomic biases. More standardized methods to determine the species most in need of funds and to identify knowledge gaps should be a priority. To achieve this, set criteria for funding should be applied, where species that are supported by private foundations should be a lower priority for international government funding, unless other benefits, such as at the ecosystem level, can be clearly demonstrated.