A new paper by Cheok and colleagues has been published in Diversity and Distributions, on the potential benefits that can arise when regional conservation priorities are updated more frequently.

Regional conservation assessments are frequently undertaken to guide strategic application of conservation actions. These actions are applied locally by individuals and communities and inevitably deviate, for a whole host of reasons, from the originally conceived priority areas at the broader, regional scale. This inherent mismatch in scales involves a necessity to update those regional conservation priorities as local actions are applied through time. This begs the question of how often should such regional priorities be updated as actions are implemented?

Through modelling simulations and using Fiji as a case study, the authors have found evidence for two potential benefits to updating priorities more frequently: 1) faster achievement of objectives for high-priority features, and 2) greater potential to capitalise on areas previously investigated. The study discusses trade-offs to consider regarding the frequency of updating regional priorities, which will vary depending on the planning context.

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