Missing, delayed, and old: The status of ESA recovery plans
- Published
- Accepted
- Subject Areas
- Biodiversity, Conservation Biology, Science Policy
- Keywords
- Endangered Species Act, recovery plan, US Fish and Wildlife Service, National Marine Fisheries Service, threatened species, endangered species
- Copyright
- © 2018 Malcom et al.
- Licence
- This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, reproduction and adaptation in any medium and for any purpose provided that it is properly attributed. For attribution, the original author(s), title, publication source (PeerJ Preprints) and either DOI or URL of the article must be cited.
- Cite this article
- 2018. Missing, delayed, and old: The status of ESA recovery plans. PeerJ Preprints 6:e2882v3 https://doi.org/10.7287/peerj.preprints.2882v3
Abstract
Recovery planning is an essential part of implementing the U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA), but conservationists and government agencies recognize challenges with the current planning process. Using data from all U.S. domestic and transboundary ESA-listed species, we quantify the completeness, timeliness, age, and other variation among ESA recovery plans over the past 40 years. We show that nearly 1/4 of eligible listed taxa (n = 1,548) lack final recovery plans; half of plans have taken >5 years to finalize after listing; half of recovery plans are more than 20 years old; and there is significant variation between agencies and among regions and taxonomic groups in planning. These results are not unexpected given dwindling budgets and an increasing number of species requiring protection, but underscore the need for systematic improvements to recovery planning. We discuss solutions—some already underway—that may address some of the shortcomings and help improve recovery action implementation for threatened and endangered species.
Author Comment
This version of the preprint uses an updated data set (08 Jan 2018) and adds an analysis of taxonomic biases in recovery plan status. The results are basically the same as in previous versions, but we set the problem up slightly differently in the Introduction, followed by slightly different context in the Discussion. Last but not least, we have substantially shortened the manuscript to conform with submission to a journal with a shorter word limit.
Supplemental Information
Section 7 consultation with recovery units
A section 7 consultation document (biological opinion) that uses recovery units, which are defined in the species' recovery plan.
A PowerPoint presentation of the US Fish and WIldlife Service's Recovery Enhancement Vision
A PowerPoint presentation of the US Fish and WIldlife Service's Recovery Enhancement Vision.
An information sheet on of the US Fish and WIldlife Service's Recovery Planning and Implementation updates (formerly Recovery Enhancement Vision)
An information sheet on of the US Fish and WIldlife Service's Recovery Planning and Implementation updates (formerly Recovery Enhancement Vision).