When you have been requested what photographs have been depicted on either side of any of your nation’s banknotes, would you be capable of confidently reply?
It is a query a crew of Griffith researchers has posed as a strategy to discover simply what natural world that nations across the globe select to symbolize on their foreign money, and the alternatives they current for conservation consciousness and efforts.
Within the new research printed in Individuals and Nature, lead creator Beaudee Newbery and his supervisors Affiliate Professor Man Castley and Dr Clare Morrison, investigated the illustration of native fauna on 4,541 banknotes from 207 international locations between 1980 and 2017, to establish geographic hotspots and taxonomic patterns, and decide whether or not threatened and endemic species have been extra readily represented.
They discovered:
“For many people around the globe utilizing banknotes and cash is a part of the on a regular basis, regardless of the growing development in direction of digital transactions,” Affiliate Professor Castley mentioned.
“However in making these transactions, will we pay any discover to the foreign money itself and the pictures and paintings which might be utilized in these designs?
“To get a way of the ‘worth’ that international locations around the globe may place on their native wildlife, our paper explored how wildlife imagery was used on banknotes.
“We have been interested by discovering out how typically wildlife, particularly native animals, have been depicted, but in addition which species have been depicted.”
The crew advisable a number of avenues for additional investigation to discover the relationships between perceived worth and wildlife illustration.
These included longitudinal research of how illustration modifications over time; the inclusion of flora and/or coin imagery; figuring out species-specific traits for chosen wildlife; and analyzing the decision-making processes governing wildlife imagery on banknotes.
“Given the worldwide biodiversity disaster, maybe there could also be a development to showcase threatened species to spotlight their plight and lift nationwide consciousness for these species,” Affiliate Professor Castley mentioned.
“This research underscores the function that wildlife imagery on banknotes can play in shaping nationwide id and public notion of a rustic’s biodiversity.”
“By highlighting each the celebrated and threatened species, currencies around the globe function a novel platform for selling conservation consciousness.”
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