The role of non-English-language science in informing national biodiversity assessments

Amano, Tatsuya, Berdejo-Espinola, Violeta, Akasaka, Munemitsu, de Andrade Junior, Milton A.U., Blaise, Ndayizeye, Checco, Julia, Çilingir, F. Gözde, Citegetse, Geoffroy, Corella Tor, Marina, Drobniak, Szymon M., Giakoumi, Sylvaine, Golivets, Marina, Ion, Mihaela C., Jara-Díaz, Javiera P., Katayose, Ryosuke, Lasmana, Felicia P.S., Lin, Hsien Yung, Lopez, Erick, Mikula, Peter, Morales-Barquero, Lucia, Mupepele, Anne Christine, Narváez-Gómez, Juan P., Nguyen, Thi Hieu, Lisboa, Sá Nogueira, Nuñez, Martin A., Pavón-Jordán, Diego, Pottier, Patrice, Prescott, Graham W., Samad, Farah, Šćiban, Marko, Seo, Hae Min, Shinoda, Yushin, Vajna, Flóra, Vozykova, Svetlana, Walsh, Jessica C., Wee, Alison K.S., Xiao, Hui and Zamora-Gutierrez, Veronica (2023) The role of non-English-language science in informing national biodiversity assessments. Nature Sustainability, 6 (7), 845-854. (doi:10.1038/s41893-023-01087-8).

Abstract

Consulting the best available evidence is key to successful conservation decision-making. While much scientific evidence on conservation continues to be published in non-English languages, a poor understanding of how non-English-language science contributes to conservation decision-making is causing global assessments and studies to practically ignore non-English-language literature. By investigating the use of scientific literature in biodiversity assessment reports across 37 countries/territories, we have uncovered the established role of non-English-language literature as a major source of information locally. On average, non-English-language literature constituted 65% of the references cited, and these were recognized as relevant knowledge sources by 75% of report authors. This means that by ignoring non-English-language science, international assessments may overlook important information on local and/or regional biodiversity. Furthermore, a quarter of the authors acknowledged the struggles of understanding English-language literature. This points to the need to aid the use of English-language literature in domestic decision-making, for example, by providing non-English-language abstracts or improving and/or implementing machine translation. (This abstract is also avaialble in 21 other languages in Supplementary Data 4).

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Contributors

Author: Veronica Zamora-Gutierrez

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