2024-08-09 06:30:00
The French IUCN Committee compared the national Red List of Threatened Species with the national species protection orders. Result: of the 2,900 species threatened with extinction on French territory, 56% do not benefit from any protection status.
For two years, a hundred experts from the Species Conservation Commission of the French Committee of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) sought to understand whether French legislation adequately protected endangered species. The least that can be said is that legal protection is lacking: more than 1,600 species, or 56% of species threatened with extinction in France, are not protected on the territory, notes the IUCN.
The Red List constitutes the scientific reference inventory which acts as a barometer of the state of biodiversity. On the nine ranking categoriesthree concern species threatened with extinction: Critically Endangered (CR), Endangered (EN), Vulnerable (VU). This list gives an indication of the risk of species disappearing and the threats they face, but has no regulatory scope.
The legal tool: species protection orders
On the regulatory side, these are ministerial or prefectural decrees, commonly called “ species protection orders”, which refer to. For each listed species, the text specifies a series of prohibitions, such as the destruction of individuals, the destruction and removal of eggs or nests, the collection or capture of specimens, their commercialization, the degradation of their natural habitats, etc.summarizes the IUCN.
Experts note unequal protection across species groups. Protective measures tend to favour mammals, birds, reptiles and amphibians. But very few fish, invertebrates or plants benefit from such measures.
For systemic protection of endangered species
The biodiversity protection association draws up four recommendations to better protect endangered species in France. The IUCN calls for “ extend the coverage of protection orders to all species classified in the categories “Critically Endangered”, “Endangered” and “Vulnerable” of the Red List”Starting with overseas territories such as Guadeloupe, Martinique, and French Polynesia, where species protection orders remain the exception.
In addition, the association calls for the inclusion of species in protection orders “ almost threatened » Who ” present vulnerability factors or strong conservation needs”This may concern slow-growing species, with a low reproduction rate or even late sexual maturity, whose populations can decline rapidly. But also endemic species whose conservation issues are particularly important.
In order to improve protection, the IUCN further recommends that: systematically integrate the protection of habitats essential to species into the decrees” and this “ to reduce pressures and significantly strengthen the effectiveness of the regulatory system”Finally, the association calls for these orders to be better updated to better respond to the state of scientific knowledge and better take into account protection needs.
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