Evaluation and Prioritization of Criteria Affecting the Selection of Landscape Species, Using Multi-Criteria Decision-Making Systems

It is impractical to implement conservation efforts for all species due to complexity of natural systems, large scale of biodiversity issues, and budget limitations. Prioritizing species of conservation importance can alleviate this issue. Multiple interrelated criteria may be used for conservation prioritization of species. Therefore, the accurate evaluation of criteria is a multi-criteria decision-making problem. In the current paper, which is a complementary study to our previous work on identifying landscape species in central Iran, we aimed to provide more details about the integrated DEMATEL Analytical Network Process (DANP) for evaluating the criteria used for the process of selecting landscape species. The impact-relation map implied that home range size had the greatest effect on other criteria and the feasibility of monitoring received the most impact from other criteria. Also, conflict with human, vulnerability to climate change, and extent of occurrence have the highest priorities for selecting landscape species. Based on our findings, multi-criteria decision making systems effectively evaluate the interrelationships between the criteria affecting the selection process of species and rank the criteria according to their impacts. This framework can be used as a guideline for prioritizing species to increase the efficiency of site-based conservation efforts.