ECOLOGICAL FUNCTIONS

Primates play vital roles in forest ecosystems through pollination, seed dispersal and the transport and cycling of nutrients, and by serving as prey for top predators. These functional roles contribute to forest sustenance and regeneration and overall ecosystem health, making primates an essential component of ecosystems. The decline and extinction of primate populations therefore threatens the plant and animal species that share their habitat.

For instance, pig-tailed and stump-tailed macaques are exceptional seed dispersers and thereby assist in spreading and establishing plant species.10 One study suggested that the extirpation of macaques can reduce the seed dispersal for trees bearing small to medium-sized fruits 20fold.11 Such a decrease would likely result in a decline in plant diversity and, in turn, impact ecosystem and human well-being. The positive impacts of primates on forest ecosystems often benefit human communities that depend on forest ecosystem services. Primates also make critical economic contributions in some areas through ecotourism and play important cultural roles throughout Southeast Asia.

As the closest living biological relative to the modern human species, wild primates also offer critical insights into human evolution, biology and behaviour, as well as emerging diseases.