Global and national trends, gaps, and opportunities in documenting and monitoring species distributions

Conserving and managing biodiversity in the face of ongoing global change requires sufficient evidence to assess status and trends of species distributions. Here, we propose novel indicators of biodiversity data coverage and sampling effectiveness and analyze national trajectories in closing spatiotemporal knowledge gaps for terrestrial vertebrates (1950 to 2019). Despite a rapid rise in data coverage, particularly in the last 2 decades, strong geographic and taxonomic biases persist. For some taxa and regions, a tremendous growth in records failed to directly translate into newfound knowledge due to a sharp decline in sampling effectiveness. However, we found that a nation's coverage was stronger for species for which it holds greater stewardship. As countries under the post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework renew their commitments to an improved, rigorous biodiversity knowledge base, our findings highlight opportunities for international collaboration to close critical information gaps.

Automated summary

Despite rapid growth in data coverage, geographic and taxonomic biases persist in closing knowledge gaps for terrestrial vertebrates. In some taxa and regions, a surge in records did not lead to new knowledge due to a decline in sampling effectiveness. Countries demonstrate stronger coverage for species they have greater stewardship over.