New research has confirmed the extinction of 79 plants in South Africa's three biodiversity hotspots – namely the Cape Floristic Region, the Succulent Karoo, and the Maputuland-Pondoland-Albany corridor.
New research has confirmed the extinction of 79 plants in South Africa's three biodiversity hotspots – namely the Cape Floristic Region, the Succulent Karoo, and the Maputuland-Pondoland-Albany corridor.
According to a study published in the journal Current Biology this week, this represents a shocking 45.4% of all known plant extinctions from 10 of the world's 36 biodiversity hotspots. Biodiversity hotspots are areas that harbour exceptionally high numbers of unique species, but at the same time they are under severe threat from human disturbance.
South Africa is remarkable in that, for a relatively small country, it is home to three of these hotspots.
An international team of researchers, led by Prof Jaco Le Roux and Dr Heidi Hirsch, affiliated with the Centre for Invasion Biology (CIB) at Stellenbosch University (SU), analysed a comprehensive dataset of 291 plant extinctions since 1700 in ten biodiversity hotspots and six coldspots (such as England, Germany and Russia), covering about 15% of the earth's land surface.
Read more at: Stellenbosch University
Photo Credit: falco via Pixabay
