Mastretta-Yanes, AliciaDa Silva, Jessica M.Grueber, Catherine E.Castillo-Reina, LuisKoeppae, ViktoriaForester, Brenna R.Funk, W. ChrisHeuertz, MyriamIshihama, FumikoJordan, RebeccaMergeay, JoachimPaz-Vinas, IvanRincon-Parra, Victor JulioRodriguez-Morales, Maria AlejandraArredondo-Amezcua, LibertadBrahy, GaelleDesaix, MattDurkee, LilyHamilton, AshleyHunter, Margaret E.Koontz, AustinLang, IrisLatorre-Cardenas, Maria CamilaLatty, TanyaLlanes-Quevedo, AlexanderMacdonald, Anna J.Mahoney, MegMiller, CaitlinOrnelas, Juan FranciscoRamirez-Barahona, SantiagoRobertson, EricaRusso, Isa-Rita M.Santiago, Metztli ArcilaShaw, Robyn E.Shea, Glenn M.Sjoegren-Gulve, PerSpence, Emma SuzukiStack, TaylorSuarez, SofiaTakenaka, AkioThurfjell, HenrikTurbek, SheelaVan der Merwe, MarlienVisser, FleurWegier, AnaWood, GeorginaZarza, EugeniaLaikre, LindaHoban, Sean2024-08-082024-08-082024-07Mastretta-Yanes, A., Da Silva, J.M., Grueber, C.E., Castillo-Reina, L., Koeppae, V., Forester, B.R. et al. (2024) Multinational evaluation of genetic diversity indicators for the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. Ecology Letters, 27, e14461. Available from: https://doi.org/10.1111/ele.144611461.1461-023X (print)1461-0248 (online)10.1111/ele.144611461http://hdl.handle.net/2263/97526DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT : Kobo forms and scripts used to collect and analyse data are available on the GitHub repository https://github.com/AliciaMstt/GeneticIndicators (Zenodo: https://zenodo.org/doi/10.5281/zenodo.10620306).The data that support the findings of this study are available in DRYAD (https://doi.org/10.5061/dryad.bk3j9kdkm). Some data that could lead to the geographic identification of endangered species have been obscured.Under the recently adopted Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, 196 Parties committed to reporting the status of genetic diversity for all species. To facilitate reporting, three genetic diversity indicators were developed, two of which focus on processes contributing to genetic diversity conservation: maintaining genetically distinct populations and ensuring populations are large enough to maintain genetic diversity. The major advantage of these indicators is that they can be estimated with or without DNA-based data. However, demonstrating their feasibility requires addressing the methodological challenges of using data gathered from diverse sources, across diverse taxonomic groups, and for countries of varying socio-economic status and biodiversity levels. Here, we assess the genetic indicators for 919 taxa, representing 5271 populations across nine countries, including megadiverse countries and developing economies. Eighty-three percent of the taxa assessed had data available to calculate at least one indicator. Our results show that although the majority of species maintain most populations, 58% of species have populations too small to maintain genetic diversity. Moreover, genetic indicator values suggest that IUCN Red List status and other initiatives fail to assess genetic status, highlighting the critical importance of genetic indicators.en© 2024 The Author(s). Ecology Letters published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. This article has been contributed to by U.S. Government employees and their work is in the public domain in the USA. This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License.Biodiversity indicatorsConvention on Biological DiversityCOP15Effective population sizePopulations maintainedRed ListSDG-15: Life on landArticle