Editing Population viability analysis (section)

{{short description|Ecological measurement of extinction risk}}
'''Population viability analysis''' ('''PVA''') is a [[species]]-specific method of [[risk assessment]] frequently used in [[conservation biology]].
It is traditionally defined as the process that determines the probability that a population will go extinct within a given number of years.
More recently, PVA has been described as a marriage of [[ecology]] and [[statistics]] that brings together species characteristics and environmental variability to forecast population health and extinction risk.  Each PVA is individually developed for a target population or species, and consequently, each PVA is unique. The larger goal in mind when conducting a PVA is to ensure that the population of a species is self-sustaining over the long term.<ref name = "Setting-Population-Target" >{{ Cite journal | issue = 11 | year = 2006 | publisher = [[Oxford University Press]] (OUP) | volume = 56 | last = Sanderson | first = Eric | page = 911 | journal = [[BioScience]] | issn = 0006-3568 | eissn = 1525-3244 | id = [[American Institute of Biological Sciences]] | doi = 10.1641/0006-3568(2006)56[911:hmadww]2.0.co;2 | s2cid = 27937209 | title = How Many Animals Do We Want to Save? The Many Ways of Setting Population Target Levels for Conservation | doi-access = free }}</ref>