title: Game auction prices are not related to biodiversity contributions of southern African ungulates and large carnivores.
abstract: There is an urgent need for human societies to become environmentally sustainable. Because public policy is largely driven by economic processes, quantifications of the relationship between market prices and environmental values can provide important information for developing strategies towards sustainability. Wildlife in southern Africa is often privately owned and traded at game auctions to be utilized for commercial purposes mostly related to tourism. This market offers an interesting opportunity to evaluate how market prices relate to biologically meaningful species characteristics. In this market, prices were not correlated with species contributions to either phylogenetic or functional diversity, and species contributions to phylogenetic or functional diversity did not influence the trends in prices over time for the past 20 years. Since this economic market did not seem to appreciate evolutionary or ecologically relevant characteristics, we question if the game tourism market may contribute towards biodiversity conservation in southern Africa. We suggest that market prices in general may have limited values as guides for directing conservation and environmental management. We further suggest that there is a need to evaluate what humans value in biological organisms, and how potentially necessary shifts in such values can be instigated.
authors.affiliation: Research Unit of Biodiversity (UO-SCIC-PA), University of Oviedo, Campus de Mieres, 33600 Mieres, Spain.|Department of Zoology, Stockholm University, 10691 Stockholm, Sweden.|Mammal Research Institute, Department of Zoology and Entomology, University of Pretoria, Private Bag X020, 0028 Pretoria, South Africa.
authors.forename: Fredrik
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Dalerum
authors.affiliation: Centre for African Ecology, School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Private Bag 3, Wits 2050, Johannesburg, South Africa.|Sports Economics Observatory Foundation (FOED), Department of Economics, University of Oviedo, 33203 Oviedo, Spain.
authors.forename: Maria
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Miranda
mesh_terms: D000353:Africa, Southern; D000818:Animals; D044822:Biodiversity; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources; D006801:Humans; D008322:Mammals / Q000145:classification* / Q000502:physiology; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D010802:Phylogeny; D011998:Recreation; D014195:Travel / Q000191:economics