Since the 1970s, when mounting evidence made it clear that human activities were threatening the survival of apes, conservationists have recognized the need to develop better ways to understand and monitor these populations in the wild.
This chapter reviews the evolution of ape surveillance, draws on data provided in the Abundance Annex and reviews key threats for each ape taxa, reflecting the most recent assessments in the International Union for Conservation of Nature Red List of Threatened Species, GRASP, and other published and unpublished reports.
The chapter notes the urgent need for:
1) evidence-based conservation frameworks that include social, economic, and ecological data, including indigenous and local knowledge,
2) rigorous evaluation of those approaches through data collection, and
3) systematic evaluation of conservation outcomes.