Towards the identification of hotspots of freshwater biodiversity in North-Western Africa: A case study using species distribution models for water beetles in Morocco

Freshwater biodiversity loss is of concern in the Mediterranean Basin, as one of the global hot-spots of biodiversity. Despite a number of faunistic and taxonomic studies that have been con-ducted in the last years in the African part of the Mediterranean Basin, our knowledge on freshwater biodiversity patterns in this area is still very limited. In this study, we aim to i) identify the areas with the highest potential species richness of water beetles, estimated from species distribution models using two different approaches (MaxEnt and Random Forest) and ii) conduct a gap analysis to assess the effectiveness of protected areas in the conservation of these areas. Results showed that the highest potential species richness of water beetles in Morocco occurs in the mountain areas of the Rif and Prerif, Middle Atlas and northern Central Plateau of Morocco. Among the identified priority areas (those in the top 5% of potential richness values), 21.6% are totally unprotected and ca. 65% are poorly protected (i.e., protected area extent < 25%). These results call for urgent and direct policies to protect North African freshwater biodiversity.