Number of threatened and extinct species in The Netherlands, by 2024

Officially assembled Red Lists show that many Dutch plant and animal species are threatened with extinction.

Assembling Red Lists

Species decreasing in population size and/or in distribution range and species that have gone extinct are placed on the Red List. The Dutch Red Lists may be regarded as a national application of the IUCN Red List (IUCN 2008), but follow their own protocol. Red Lists are assembled approximately every ten years for a number of species groups, based on the Red List status per species. As a species continues to decline and becomes increasingly rare, it is assigned a more severe Red List threat category. The following threat categories are distinguished: least concern, near threatened, vulnerable, endangered, critically endangered, extinct (in this context meaning ‘extinct in The Netherlands’), and data deficient.   

 

To date, official Red Lists of 19 species groups (pertaining to fish only for freshwater fish) have been compiled. The Red list status of each evaluated species is published in the Dutch Government Gazette. For most of these 19 species groups, the Red List status of each species of native and established species in The Netherlands, for which there is enough data, has been revised and published in the Government Gazette for a second time, resulting in updated Red Lists. Only species that have procreated for at least ten consecutive years in The Netherlands are considered. Sources (below) lists the proposals for the Red Lists (most with an English summary) and the announcements in the Dutch Government Gazette. 

The Red List Stoneflies has been assembled for the first time in 2024 and published in the Dutch Government Gazette in October 2024. The Red Lists Amphibians and Reptiles were most recently revised. At the end of 2023 RAVON (Reptiles Amphibians Fish Research Netherlands) assembled the proposal Red List (both species groups in the same proposal list) and in October 2024 the species were published in the Dutch Government Gazette.

Threatened and extinct species

In each of the 19 species groups, at least one third of the species are listed in the Red List with a threatened or extinct status. In some species groups the ratio is much higher. For reptiles it pertains to 5 out of 7 species (71%); for butterflies 47 out of 76 species (62%); for stoneflies 19 out of 33 (58%); for bees 181 out of 331 (55%); for lichens 389 out of 727 (54%), and for bryophytes 246 out of 517 (48%; see table under Download data).

 

In the species groups butterflies, stoneflies, bees and mayflies the proportion of species that have gone extinct in The Netherlands is relatively high. Many threatened species are not protected by law. 

Trend of Red List species

Periodical revisions of Red Lists make it possible to derive trends in the numbers of threatened and extinct species over time. However, with a revision frequency of approximately ten years, such trends do not reflect the actual situation in the years between revisions. By constructing “virtual” Red Lists in the years between official Red List publications, it is possible to calculate the trend in the number of threatened species on a yearly basis (see the Red List Indicator).

Red List Indicator

Sources

  • IUCN (2008). The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. International Union for Conservation of Nature, Gland.
  • LNV (2004). Besluit van de Minister van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit van 4 november 2004, nr. TRCJZ/2004/5727, houdende vaststelling van Rode lijsten flora en fauna. Staatscourant 218 (2004). [zoogdieren, vogels, reptielen, amfibieën, vissen, bijen, dagvlinders, kokerjuffers, sprinkhanen en krekels, steenvliegen, libellen, haften, land- en zoetwaterweekdieren, platwormen, vaatplanten, mossen, korstmossen en paddestoelen (macrofungi)]
  • LNV (2009). Besluit van de Minister van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit van 28 augustus 2009, nr. 25344, houdende vaststelling van geactualiseerde Rode lijsten flora en fauna. Staatscourant 13201 (2009). [zoogdieren, reptielen, amfibieën, dagvlinders, paddenstoelen (macrofungi)]
  • EZ (2015). Besluit van de Staatssecretaris van Economische Zaken van 15 oktober 2015, DGAN-PDJNG / 15129301, houdende vaststelling van geactualiseerde Rode lijsten flora en fauna. Staatscourant 36471 (2015). [korstmossen, mossen, vaatplanten, libellen, sprinkhanen en krekels, vissen]
  • LNV(2017). Besluit van de Minister van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit van 18 november 2017, nr. 17174206, houdende vaststelling van een geactualiseerde Rode Lijst Vogels. Staatscourant 68427 (2017). [vogels]
  • LNV (2018). Besluit van de Minister van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit van 30 april 2018, nr. 18072244, houdende vaststelling van een geactualiseerde Rode Lijst Bijen. Staatscourant 24897 (2018). [bijen]
  • LNV (2019). Besluit van de Minister van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit van 22 februari 2019, DGNVLG/19045629, houdende vaststelling van een geactualiseerde Rode Lijst Dagvlinders. Staatscourant 12182 (2019). [dagvlinders]
  • LNV (2020). Besluit van de Minister van Landbouw, Natuur en Voedselkwaliteit van 14 oktober 2020, DGNVLG/20246331, houdende vaststelling van een geactualiseerde Rode Lijst Zoogdieren. Staatscourant 56788 (2020). [zoogdieren]

Relevant information

Verdonschot, P. F. M, Higler, L. W. G., Nijboer, R. C., & Van den Hoek, Tj. H. (2003). Naar een doelsoortenlijst van aquatische macrofauna in Nederland; Platwormen (Tricladida), Steenvliegen (Plecoptera), Haften (Ephemeroptera) en Kokerjuffers (Trichoptera). Alterra-rapport 858, Wageningen. [flatworms, stoneflies, mayflies, caddisflies]

Technical explanation

Name of the data

Number of threatened and extinct species

Description

Number of species per threat category that are extinct or threatened according to the officially confirmed Red Lists.

Responsible institute

Statistics Netherlands

Calculation method

The graph shows the percentage of species per species group per Red List category of the total number of considered species in the species group. The number of species per Red List threat category within a species group is copied from the most recent Red List of each species group, after the proposal Red List has become official by publication in the Dutch Government Gazette.   

There is, as of yet, no proposal Red List for marine fish, only two preliminary reports (see Sources Gmelig Meyling & Van Moorsel, 2013, and Tien et al., 2016).

The Red List status of a species is determined by the actual scarcity of the species and its trend since circa 1950 (but see the proposal Red Lists of the species groups for the details regarding the exact determination of the status). This method differs from the internationally prevailing IUCN-method in which the trend over the last ten years mainly determines the Red List status of a species.

Base table

The number of species per threat category per species group is available via Download data.

Geographical distribution

The Netherlands

Andere variabelen

None

Publication frequency

Irregular (updated when a new Red List is published in the Dutch Government Gazette)

Opmerking

Versions of this indicator prior to 2024 included proposal Red Lists that had not been confirmed by publication in the Dutch Government Gazette.

Versions of this indicator prior to 2024 included comparisons with Red Lists of other countries. However, these foreign Red Lists used the IUCN method, which is not identical to the method used in The Netherlands. 

Trust code

A. The Red List status of each species has been confirmed by publication in the Dutch Government Gazette and as such counts as a ‘complete count’. 

Reference of this webpage

CLO (2024). Number of threatened and extinct species in The Netherlands, by 2024 (indicator 1052, version 18, ), www.clo.nl. Statistics Netherlands (CBS), The Hague; PBL Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency, The Hague; RIVM National Institute for Public Health and the Environment, Bilthoven; and Wageningen University and Research, Wageningen.