Ecological restoration as a strategy for conserving biological diversity

Though the restoration of disturbed ecosystems has so far played a relatively modest role in the effort to conserve biological diversity, there are reasons to suspect that its role will increase and that its contribution to the maintenance of diversity will ultimately prove crucial as techniques are further refined and as pristine areas for preservation become scarcer and more expensive.It is now possible to restore a number of North American communities with some confidence. However, it should be noted that many current efforts to return degraded lands to productive use, like attempts to reclaim land disturbed by mining, try only for rehabilitation to a socially acceptable condition and fall considerably short of actually restoring a native ecological community.Possible uses for restoration in the conservation of biodiversity include not only the creation of habitat on derelict sites, but also techniques for enlarging and redesigning existing reserves. Restoration may even make it possible to move reserves entirely in response to long-term events, such as changes in climate. Restoration in the form of reintroduction of single species to preexisting or restored habitat is also a critical link in programs to conserve species ex situ in the expectation of eventually returning them to the wild. And restoration provides opportunities to increase diversity through activities as diverse as management of utility corridors, transportation rights-of-way, and parks.     

开发建设项目对生物多样性的影响评价方法构想

开发建设项目的经济利益与生物多样性保护之间的矛盾日益突出，迫切需要在环境影响评价工作中解决。本文利用模糊综合评价建立起一套方法体系来解决这一现实问题。     

When implementation works: A comparison of Ramsar Convention implementation in different continents

What are the processes that shape implementation of multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) in multilevel governance? In an attempt to address this question, we move from a top-down view of implementation as compliance with international rules to viewing it as a dynamic process shaped by action at various levels. The Ramsar Convention on Wetlands offers an important context to understand the mechanisms that shape multilevel implementation outcomes. We examine Ramsar Convention implementation in Austria, Mexico, and the Republic of Korea in order to identify relevant processes that define multilevel implementation. These cases represent three different types of government, and shed light on the ways in which international law is implemented by respective governments. The Austrian case, a federal government, illustrates the ways in which subnational authorities (the provinces) are influenced by binding regional institutions (EU-rules) to create a more robust context for protection in terms of designation of Ramsar sites. The Mexican case, a semi-federal government, shows how spurred involvement by local NGOs, states, and scientists can result in significant expansion of efforts. The Korean case, a unitary government, demonstrates the ways in which aligning institutional interests (in this case local governments with national ministries) can lead to strong implementation. Analysis of these cases provides two robust findings and one deserving additional study. First, overlapping governance efforts where activity has ties with multiple regional and international biodiversity efforts tend to see cumulative implementation. Second, institutional and organizational complexity can provide opportunities for local actors to drive the implementation agenda through a mix of processes of coordination and contentious politics. A third, more tentative finding, is that multilevel funding sources can ease implementation.     

Drivers of landholder participation in tender programs for Australian biodiversity conservation

Conservation tender program have been widely applied to biodiversity conservation in Australia and internationally in recent decades. Increasing participation rates is critical to these schemes, as competition is required for the cost-effectiveness benefits of the tender system to be fully realized. However, knowledge relating to the drivers of landholder participation in tender programs is limited. This study aims to identify the relative importance of different drivers of participation in Victorian conservation tenders. The novel method of maximum entropy ordinal regression is used given the small sample size, and supplemented with qualitative data obtained through face-to-face interviews. The regression analysis reveals that strong relationships between agencies and landholders and a low administrative burden drive increased participation. The provision of education, support, and easily-integrated management practices, however, may drive lower participation, with landholders confident to undertake conservation activities independently of assistance. Some evidence emerges that ten-year contracts may be well-received. A key concern is low additionality in biodiversity benefits, with typical tender participants displaying a strong conservation ethic and high levels of management activity pre-participation. This work has shown that in conservation policies involving self-selection by participants, economic incentives for adoption may be less important than non-monetary drivers.     

Utilitarian framings of biodiversity shape environmental impact assessment in development cooperation

Biodiversity is under threat from anthropogenic pressures, in particular in biodiversity-rich developing countries. Development cooperation actors, who traditionally focus on the improvement of socio-economic conditions in the South, are increasingly acknowledging the linkages between poverty and biodiversity, e.g. by referring to the ecosystem services framework. However, there are many different framings which stress the need for biodiversity integration and which influence how biodiversity and development are and/or should be linked. Moreover, there is a gap between the lip service paid to biodiversity integration and the reality of development cooperation interventions. This study analyses how biodiversity framings are reflected in environmental impact assessment (EIA) practice, and how these framings influence EIA and decision-making. The findings, based on an in-depth qualitative analysis of World Bank EIAs undertaken in West Africa, indicate the incoherent quality but also the dominance of the ‘utilitarian’ and ‘corrective’ framings, which respectively stress human use of nature and mitigation of negative unintended development impacts. Identifying and highlighting these discursive trends leads to increased awareness of the importance of biodiversity among all development actors in North and South. However, some framings may lead to an overly narrow human-centred approach which downplays the intrinsic value of biodiversity. This study proposes recommendations for an improved integration of biodiversity in development cooperation, including the need for more systematic baseline studies in EIAs.     

Combining internal and external motivations in multi-actor governance arrangements for biodiversity and ecosystem services

This paper analyses the possibility of building a mutually supportive dynamics between internally and externally motivated behaviour for biodiversity conservation and ecosystem services provision. To this purpose a face to face survey amongst 169 key actors of 34 highly successful and prominent biodiversity arrangements in seven EU countries was conducted. The main finding of the paper is the feasibility of combining inherently intrinsically motivated behaviours (providing enjoyment, pleasure from experimentation and learning, aesthetic satisfaction) and internalized extrinsic motivations (related to the identification with the collective goals of conservation policy) through a common set of governance features. Successful initiatives that combine internal and external motivations share the following features: inclusive decision making processes, a broad monitoring by “peers” beyond the core staff of the initiatives, and a context that is supportive for the building of autonomous actor competences. These findings are in line with the psycho-sociological theory of motivation, which shows the importance of a psycho-social context leading to a subjective perception of autonomy and a sense of competence of the actors.     

Biological benthic tools as indicators of coastal marine ecosystems health

Coastal marine ecosystems are increasingly subjected to environmental stress and degradation due to pollution. Several research programmes have addressed this problem and produced relevant data sets for specific areas, often including consistent sets of environmental and biological variables. The value of existing information gathered from these types of data can be largely increased by combining them into a common data set to determine globally applicable relationships. To perform this exercise, the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission (IOC) of UNESCO has recently formed the Ad hoc Study Group on Benthic Indicators (http://www.ioc.unesco.org/benthicindicators) with the aim of developing robust indicators of benthic health. In this paper, initial products and ongoing activities of this international initiative are described and discussed. An expansion of initial IOC/UNESCO research on benthic fauna-organic carbon relationships is also presented. As part of this follow-up research, the relationship between total organic carbon concentrations of sediment and abundance, biomass and species diversity of benthic macrofauna was evaluated using data sets from 2 different regions of the world comprising 3 different coastal marine environments. The ability of identifying threshold levels in selected variables that could serve as indicators of related adverse environmental conditions leading to stress in the benthos is envisaged within the frame of a larger joint analysis, carried out by the IOC/UNESCO Study Group on Benthic Indicators, of merged data sets from several coastal regions worldwide.     

Siberian environmental change: Synthesis of recent studies and opportunities for networking

A recent multidisciplinary compilation of studies on changes in the Siberian environment details how climate is changing faster than most places on Earth with exceptional warming in the north and increased aridity in the south. Impacts of these changes are rapid permafrost thaw and melt of glaciers, increased flooding, extreme weather events leading to sudden changes in biodiversity, increased forest fires, more insect pest outbreaks, and increased emissions of CO₂ and methane. These trends interact with sociological changes leading to land-use change, globalisation of diets, impaired health of Arctic Peoples, and challenges for transport. Local mitigation and adaptation measures are likely to be limited by a range of public perceptions of climate change that vary according to personal background. However, Siberia has the possibility through land surface feedbacks to amplify or suppress climate change impacts at potentially global levels. Based on the diverse studies presented in this Ambio Special Issue, we suggest ways forward for more sustainable environmental research and management.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s13280-021-01626-7.     

Exploring fisheries strategies for the western English Channel using an ecosystem model

An ecosystem model of the western English Channel ecosystem in 1994 was used to explore the effects of the use of a fishing policy optimization routine on profits, number of jobs and ecosystem structure. The optimization for single objective led to the specialization of the fishing fleet, with some fleet types being almost excluded. The profits and mainly the job optimizations led to big changes in the ecosystem structure, with loss of diversity, but the overall biomass of all vertebrate groups represented in the model increased considerably. For the objective focusing on ecosystem structure, there was an increase in biodiversity, with many long-lived groups predicted to increase, although the overall vertebrate biomass suffered just a small increase. An “ideal” mixed policy configuration was found when slightly greater weight was given to ecosystem structure than was given to profits and jobs. This scenario led to an overall reduction in effort but also to increased profits and biodiversity, while keeping the number of jobs at the same level as the baseline estimates. The results of the optimizations showed that the average trophic level of the catches is quite resistant to changes in the underlying system structure. On the other hand, despite the high level of aggregation of the model structure, a biodiversity index estimated by the model presented large changes as a function of the weights placed on the single policy functions, reflecting the changes in the system structure. The output of the application of the fishing optimization presented here should be considered in qualitative rather than in quantitative terms as an aid and part contribution to the complicated discussions on future long term management actions. Nonetheless it points to an overall reduction in fishing capacity, an objective widely accepted within the scientific community, while keeping the fishery in a profitable state.     

Linkages between biodiversity conservation and global climate change in small island developing States (SIDS)

Global climate change is an important cause of biodiversity loss. The conservation, sustainable management and use of biodiversity resources are key factors that can be effectively used to minimize the adverse impacts of global climate change. Efforts to understand and address the linkages between global climate change and biodiversity loss are both urgent and timely. Integrating responses related to these two global environmental challenges is especially relevant for small island developing States (SIDS) because the adverse impacts of climate change can impose severe stresses on biodiversity resources that are fragile, vulnerable and already under stress and the people who depend upon them. This paper argues that comprehensive assessments of adverse impacts of global climate change on the biodiversity resources of SIDS, and an improved understanding of relevant climate change related adaptation measures and sustainable energy policies (that are based on the principles of conservation, sustainable management and use of biodiversity resources) will enable SIDS to become more resilient and to develop better response capacities.