As human population continues to increase, and the current species extinction event involves more species and greater areas, biogeographic information that is both spatially comprehensive and of appropriate resolution is becoming more important for managing our biological resources effectively. General recognition of this tenet is recent, responding in part to conservation crises and their related large costs, and in part to emerging ecological principles and knowledge integrated across multiple levels of biotic organization. Conservation crises have become more frequent, and the costs associated with them have continued to rise. For example, resolution of the old-growth redwood forest issue in northern California has taken years of litigation and physical confrontation. It cost the State of California and the federal government about $450 million for direct acquisition of 10,000 acres—the most expensive acquisition of conservation lands in history—as well as millions in legal and other expenses to all parties. The cost of dealing with endangered species by federal and state agencies was estimated at $314 million in 1998 alone. Costs born by private, nonprofit and for-profit organizations are not known, but even if they are within an order of magnitude of this amount they make up a significant singleyear cost. One can expect these amounts to increase substantially over the next decade. For example, to reach a recovery rate of 50% for endangered or threatened species would require an additional $300 million per year (Scott and others, unpublished).

Without spatially explicit data, it is unlikely that the forces causing habitat losses (e.g., invasive species, accelerating rates of resource uses, infrastructure development, recreation, etc.) can be managed effectively to reduce biodiversity loss, or that an adequate network of conservation areas can be successfully designed. Thanks to the first decade of GAP, the capability exists today to produce spatially explicit information on the distribution and status of each species and vegetation alliance, compiling and organizing the sum of knowledge we have about these elements at the same time. With this information, decisions about the myriad of activities affecting the nation’s biological diversity can now benefit from a common, widely available knowledge base. For example, the information has been used at the national level for identifying and siting new National Wildlife Refuges, at the regional level for prioritizing private acquisition of conservation lands, at the state level for mitigating new infrastructure impacts and containing environmental costs, and at the local level for county planning and land trust conservation easement acquisitions. In sum, a significantly greater level of certainty is being provided to resource users, managers, planners, and researchers.

Given a decade of experience, what should the GAP program achieve over the next ten years? The extent and complexity of our biological resources are so vast and the amount of our information still relatively small that without a cohesive approach to genetic, population, species, community, and landscape information, it seems unlikely that the Gap Analysis Program will reach its full potential. Without broad-based support for developing such information, the GAP goal of helping our clients understand a reasonable set of future scenarios affecting our biological resources would be in jeopardy.

The Gap Analysis Program is now past the proof-of-concept stage. The scientific basis, multi-organizational capability, and technical methodologies needed to fully realize the original vision have matured and are well established. We need to continue working with a framework that can expand and change with improved knowledge and information on an indefinite basis, as forcing variables such as economic trends, climate change, and population growth continue to shape the patterns of life on Earth. However, in order to continue making progress in solving the serious and complex problems of biodiversity loss, we must focus on key elements of the program, including:

• A long-term plan for updating, maintaining, archiving, and extending GAP information in each state.

• Applying GAP to the 21 phyla other than chordates. Each vertebrate species other than fish has been covered by GAP; little work has been done on species of other phyla.

• Applying the established methods for data development and analyses in aquatic environments.

• Improving the land stewardship data layer by mapping land uses that have effects on biodiversity; adopting or developing a finergrained land stewardship and land use classification.

• Continued improvement of consistency in methods among state projects.

• Regionalizing state-level data to cover large multistate regions and conducting analyses of those data sets.

• Synchronizing second-generation state projects to achieve regional consistencies in data and analyses.

• Using the results of GAP projects to test hypotheses. For example, the species distribution data sets can be applied to explore basic issues in biogeography; important new methods for reserve identification, selection, and design can be tested. Results from such applications can then provide critical feedback for revising GAP techniques.

• An aggressive suite of outreach and extension activities to ensure that GAP cooperators and clients are able to make full use of GAP products. For example, development of a same look-and-feel interactive digital atlas usable by educators and the public for each state, linked to rangewide element distributions for context expression.

• An international component to meet the existing and unmet demand for transferring GAP science and technology to other nations.

• Continued research and development of promising new science and technologies. There are important opportunities for devel- oping more robust and accurate species distribution models; new concepts are emerging for dealing with accuracy assessment by graphically representing the uncertainty in the data using an intuitive display.

• Strengthening program efficacies within the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) by taking full advantage of capabilities in the Water Resources Division, National Mapping Division, and Geologic Division.

Of course, continuity of GAP’s successful partner-based organization, as well as its fundamental approach to mapping components of biodiversity, must remain central to the output of useful information. Assuring scientific credibility by using the peer-review process must continue as a critical part of how GAP does business. Over the past decade GAP has produced many hundreds of peer-reviewed articles giving the concept and the program legitimacy and recognition within the scientific community. We must continue getting the results of state projects into peer-reviewed journals and into the hands of users by recasting results in formats that are more quickly absorbed by the public and nonspecialists. Without these steps a project is not complete.

The extent to which each of these key elements is dealt with effectively will depend largely on the amount of funds provided, including the core USGS funding as well as cooperator funding and other forms of support. Central to this are ongoing efforts by those implementing GAP at the state level to develop support. It is especially important that their cooperating institutions actively express the value of the program to their work and the need for new initiatives that would strengthen basic and matched funding. The conceptual, science, technology, and cooperative basis to meet the need for advanced biodiversity management are in place, and we believe “smart conservation” can be accomplished with relatively modest funding. GAP has been a large and successful experiment so far. The best possible chance to avert the growing biodiversity crises is by building on the initial success of GAP. As Wilson (2000) recently stated: “Within the broader framework of ecosystem studies, community ecology in particular is about to emerge as one of the most significant intellectual frontiers of the twenty-first century. Although it still has only a mouse’s share of the science funding, it stands intellectually in the front ranks with astrophysics, genomics, and neuroscience. . . . To single-species searches and mapping can be added the already well-developed technique of gap analysis . . .”

We invite the GAP community to provide us with their suggestions, comments, and insights on GAP for the next decade.

Literature Cited

Wilson, E.O. 2000. On the future of conservation biology. Conservation Biology 14(1):1-3.