Skip to Content

Resource hub

Conservation Designations for UK Taxa 2023

Abstract

This collection of files details the conservation designations of over 13,000 UK "taxa" that have been assigned some form of rarity, threat or legal status in Great Britain or the UK. It is a collation of many different "designation" lists including country-specific lists, and lists produced by national and International conventions or directives.

The collection of files contains an Excel workbook, a guidance document detailing how to use the spreadsheet, and a document detailing the constituents lists included in the spreadsheet. These resources are available to download either separately or as a zipped file.

The following designation types are included in the spreadsheet:

  • Bern Convention (Appendices 1, 2 and 3);
  • Bonn Convention – Convention on the Conservation of Migratory Species (Appendices 1 and 2, AEWA, ASCOBANS, EUROBATS);
  • Biodiversity Action Plan (BAP) UK priority species list;
  • Birds Directive (Annexes 1, 2.1 and 2.2);
  • Birds of Conservation Concern (Red/Amber list and not based on IUCN criteria);
  • Convention on Migratory Species;
  • EC CITES (Annexes A, B, C and D);
  • Global Red list status (this includes red listings based on pre-1994, 1994 and 2001 IUCN guidelines);
  • Habitats Directive (Annexes 2, 4 and 5);
  • Nationally Rare/Scarce (not based on IUCN criteria);
  • Nationally Scarce and Nationally Rare Species (also with an IUCN status);
  • National Red Lists (this includes red listings based on pre-1994, 1994 and 2001 IUCN guidelines);
  • OSPAR;
  • Protection of Badgers Act 1992;
  • Species of principal importance in England, Scotland, Wales and North Ireland (NERC section 41 and 42 lists, Scottish Biodiversity List and Northern Ireland Priority Species List);
  • The Conservation (Nature Habitats) Regulations (NI) 1995 (Schedule 2, 3 and 4);
  • The Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2010 (Schedule 2, 4 and 5);
  • The Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981 (Schedule 1, 5 and 8);
  • Wildlife (NI) Order 1985 (Schedule 1 part 1, Schedule 1 part 2, Schedule 5, Schedule 8 part 1, Schedule 8 part 2).

Please note, this is not a fully comprehensive collation of designations for UK species; for example, local red list assessments are not included, and for some reporting categories only selected annexes/appendices/schedules are included. Note that the generic term "taxa" is in this context a more strictly accurate term than "species" because some of the listed entities are ranked as being either above or below the "species" level.

A spreadsheet containing a consolidated list of threatened (Red listed) Fauna and Flora, originating from the Species designations spreadsheet, is also available. This information can be found within the species designations spreadsheet by filtering the Red list columns. Please note, this spreadsheet will only be updated when the Species designations spreadsheet is updated.

Further information, including details of updates, is available on the Conservation designations webpage.

To provide feedback on the Conservation Designations for UK Taxa spreadsheet, please get in touch.

These resources may not be fully accessible for all users. If you need a copy in a different or more accessible format, please get in touch.

Resource type NonGeographicDataset

Topic category Biota

Reference date 2023·12·06

Lineage
This dataset is a collation of various conservation designation listings. JNCC compiles the information from a variety of published sources such as Red lists, Taxon Status Reviews, UK Priority species lists and schedules of international and national legislation. The species names on these lists are all cross referenced to the recommended taxon names on the UK Species Inventory managed by the Natural History Museum on behalf of the National Biodiversity Network. This matching process ensures that all of the designations relating to an individual species are all correctly tagged for that species. On some published lists the designated names are for groups of organisms such as "all bats" or "all cetaceae" (whales and dolphins). In such cases the individual species naturally occurring within the UK are listed. The first version of this list was published in 2004. An audit trail of subsequent updates is shown here https://jncc.gov.uk/our-work/conservation-designations-for-uk-taxa-updates/ The JNCC collation of species designations is used within the Recorder biological recording software package.

Responsible organisation
Digital and Data Solutions, JNCC custodian

Limitations on public access No Limitations

Use constraints Available under the Open Government Licence v3. Re-use requires acknowledgement of the source of the information in your product or application by including or linking to the following attribution statement: "Contains JNCC/NE/NRW/NatureScot/NIEA data © copyright and database right 2023".

Metadata date 2023·12·13

Metadata point of contact
Digital and Data Solutions, JNCC

Temporal extent 1979·01·01 2023·04·23

Back to top