Global patterns of vulnerability to wildlife exploitation in tropical birds and mammals

Martin PHILIPPE-LESAFFRE , Iago Ferreiro-Arias, Ana Benítez-López¹

Wildlife exploitation is one of the most pervasive anthropogenic pressures in tropical ecosystems and a major driver of vertebrate population declines, yet global assessments of species vulnerability to hunting remain spatially imprecise and methodologically inconsistent. We combine exposure to hunting with species-specific sensitivity and adaptive capacity to deliver a spatially explicit pantropical vulnerability assessment for 6,338 bird and 3,837 mammal species across three exploitation purposes: direct consumption, product trade, and pet trade. We computed both species-level vulnerability across each species' range and assemblage-level vulnerability across the tropics. Phylogenetically, the most vulnerable groups include large herbivores, pangolins, medium- and large-sized birds, ground-dwelling birds, and primates, with primates showing discrepancy compared to the IUCN Red List assessments for the Indomalayan realm. At the assemblage level, vulnerability hotspots emerge across Sundaland, southeastern China, western and southern Africa, the Atlantic Forest, and the southern Gran Chaco. Spatial patterns are broadly congruent across taxa and exploitation purposes, but regional divergences arise, particularly for birds on islands and for mammals in New Guinea and the Neotropics. Our framework provides a standardized, flexible, and updatable tool to complement existing assessments and support conservation prioritization of areas and taxa under hunting pressure across the tropics.