Toward Better Conservation: A Spatial Analysis of Species Occurrence Data from the Global Biodiversity Information Facility

Abstract. The world is facing an unprecedented loss of biodiversity, with nearly one million species on the brink of extinction, and the extinction rate accelerating. Conservation efforts are often hindered by insufficient information on crucial ecosystems. To address this issue, our paper leverages advances in machine-based pattern recognition to estimate species occurrence maps using georeferenced data from the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). Our algorithms have generated maps for more than 600,000 species, including vertebrates, arthropods, mollusks, other animals, vascular plants, fungi, and other organisms. Validation involved comparing these maps with expert maps for mammals, ants, and vascular plants. We found a close similarity in global distribution patterns, with regional differences attributed to technical variations or necessary revisions in existing expert maps based on GBIF data. As a practical application, we identified the global distributions of approximately 68,000 species with small ranges (25 km x 25 km or less) confined to a single country. Our maps reveal a skewed international distribution of these species, identifying 30 countries where 78.2 percent are concentrated. These results highlight the need to integrate the newly mapped GBIF data into global conservation planning. Our algorithms support rapid updates and the creation of new maps as GBIF occurrence reports increase. The data are available on the World Bank Development Data Hub at https://doi.org/10.57966/h21e-vq42 (Dasgupta et al. 2024).