Typifying conservation practitioners’ views on the role of education

Education is an established tool to enhance human–environment relationships, despite the lack of empirical evidence to support its use. We used theories of change to unpack assumptions about the role of education in conservation. We interviewed practitioners from 15 conservation organizations in Madagascar to typify implicit pathways of change and assess whether emerging pathways echo theoretical advances. Five pathways were drivers of change: increasing knowledge, changing emotional connection and changing traditional cultural practices, fostering leaders, diversifying outcomes, and influencing community and society. These pathways reflect existing sociopsychological theories on learning and behavioral change. Most interviewees’ organizations had a predominant pathway that was often combined with elements from other pathways. Most pathways lacked culturally grounded approaches. Our research reveals assumptions about the role of education in conservation and indicates that organizations had different ideas of how change happens. The diversity of practices reflects the complexity of factors that influence behavior. Whether this diversity is driven by local sociocultural context, interaction with other conservation approaches, or contingencies remains unclear. Yet, typifying the pathways of change and reflecting on them is the first step towards comprehensive evaluation of when and which pathways and interactions to promote.     

Transcending capitalism growth strategies for biodiversity conservation

The unlimited economic growth that fuels capitalism's metabolism has profoundly transformed a large portion of Earth. The resulting environmental destruction has led to an unprecedented rate of biodiversity loss. Following large-scale losses of habitats and species, it was recognized that biodiversity is crucial to maintaining functional ecosystems. We sought to continue the debate on the contradictions between economic growth and biodiversity in the conservation science literature and thus invite scholars to engage in reversing the biodiversity crisis through acknowledging the impacts of economic growth. In the 1970s, a global agenda was set to develop different milestones related to sustainable development, including green–blue economic growth, which despite not specifically addressing biodiversity reinforced the idea that economic development based on profit is compatible with the planet's ecology. Only after biodiversity loss captured the attention of environmental sciences researchers in the early 2000s was a global biodiversity agenda implemented. The agenda highlights biodiversity conservation as a major international challenge and recognizes that the main drivers of biodiversity loss derive from economic activities. The post-2000 biodiversity agendas, including the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the post-2020 Convention on Biological Diversity Global Strategy Framework, do not consider the negative impacts of growth-oriented strategies on biodiversity. As a result, global biodiversity conservation priorities are governed by the economic value of biodiversity and its assumed contribution to people's welfare. A large body of empirical evidence shows that unlimited economic growth is the main driver of biodiversity loss in the Anthropocene; thus, we strongly argue for sustainable degrowth and a fundamental shift in societal values. An equitable downscaling of the physical economy can improve ecological conditions, thus reducing biodiversity loss and consequently enhancing human well-being.     

Effects of human footprint and biophysical factors on the body-size structure of fished marine species

Marine fisheries in coastal ecosystems in many areas of the world have historically removed large-bodied individuals, potentially impairing ecosystem functioning and the long-term sustainability of fish populations. Reporting on size-based indicators that link to food-web structure can contribute to ecosystem-based management, but the application of these indicators over large (cross-ecosystem) geographical scales has been limited to either fisheries-dependent catch data or diver-based methods restricted to shallow waters (<20 m) that can misrepresent the abundance of large-bodied fished species. We obtained data on the body-size structure of 82 recreationally or commercially targeted marine demersal teleosts from 2904 deployments of baited remote underwater stereo-video (stereo-BRUV). Sampling was at up to 50 m depth and covered approximately 10,000 km of the continental shelf of Australia. Seascape relief, water depth, and human gravity (i.e., a proxy of human impacts) were the strongest predictors of the probability of occurrence of large fishes and the abundance of fishes above the minimum legal size of capture. No-take marine reserves had a positive effect on the abundance of fishes above legal size, although the effect varied across species groups. In contrast, sublegal fishes were best predicted by gradients in sea surface temperature (mean and variance). In areas of low human impact, large fishes were about three times more likely to be encountered and fishes of legal size were approximately five times more abundant. For conspicuous species groups with contrasting habitat, environmental, and biogeographic affinities, abundance of legal-size fishes typically declined as human impact increased. Our large-scale quantitative analyses highlight the combined importance of seascape complexity, regions with low human footprint, and no-take marine reserves in protecting large-bodied fishes across a broad range of species and ecosystem configurations.     

Priority areas for conservation of Old World vultures

The prosperity and well-being of human societies relies on healthy ecosystems and the services they provide. However, the biodiversity crisis is undermining ecosystems services and functions. Vultures are among the most imperiled taxonomic groups on Earth, yet they have a fundamental ecosystem function. These obligate scavengers rapidly consume large amounts of carrion and human waste, a service that may aid in both disease prevention and control of mammalian scavengers, including feral dogs, which in turn threaten humans. We combined information about the distribution of all 15 vulture species found in Europe, Asia, and Africa with their threats and used detailed expert knowledge on threat intensity to prioritize critical areas for conserving vultures in Africa and Eurasia. Threats we identified included poisoning, mortality due to collision with wind energy infrastructures, and other anthropogenic activities related to human land use and influence. Areas important for vulture conservation were concentrated in southern and eastern Africa, South Asia, and the Iberian Peninsula, and over 80% of these areas were unprotected. Some vulture species required larger areas for protection than others. Finally, countries that had the largest share of all identified important priority areas for vulture conservation were those with the largest expenditures related to rabies burden (e.g., India, China, and Myanmar). Vulture populations have declined markedly in most of these countries. Restoring healthy vulture populations through targeted actions in the priority areas we identified may help restore the ecosystem services vultures provide, including sanitation and potentially prevention of diseases, such as rabies, a heavy burden afflicting fragile societies. Our findings may guide stakeholders to prioritize actions where they are needed most in order to achieve international goals for biodiversity conservation and sustainable development.     

Opportunities and challenges for Common Agricultural Policy reform to support the European Green Deal

The Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) is the European Union's main instrument for agricultural planning, with a new reform approved for 2023–2027. The CAP intends to align with the European Green Deal (EGD), a set of policy initiatives underpinning sustainable development and climate neutrality in the European Union (EU), but several flaws cast doubts about the compatibility of the objectives of these 2 policies. We reviewed recent literature on the potential of CAP environmental objectives for integration with the EGD: protection of biodiversity, climate change mitigation and adaptation, and sustainable management of natural resources. The CAP lacks appropriate planning measures, furthering instead risks to biodiversity and ecosystem services driven by landscape and biotic homogenization. Funding allocation mechanisms are not tailored to mitigate agricultural emissions, decreasing the efficiency of climate mitigation actions. The legislation subsidies farmers making extensive use of synthetic inputs without adequately supporting organic production, hindering the transition toward sustainable practices. We recommend proper control mechanisms be introduced in CAP Strategic Plans from each member state to ensure the EU is set on a sustainable production and consumption path. These include proportional assignment of funds to each CAP objective, quantitative targets to set goals and evidence-based interventions, and relevant indicators to facilitate effective monitoring of environmental performance. Both the CAP and the EGD should maintain ambitious environmental commitments in the face of crisis to avoid further degradation of the natural resources on which production systems stand.     

Metrics for quantifying how much different threats contribute to red lists of species and ecosystems

Red lists are a crucial tool for the management of threatened species and ecosystems. Among the information red lists provide, the threats affecting the listed species or ecosystem, such as pollution or hunting, are of special relevance. This information can be used to quantify the relative contribution of different threat factors to biodiversity loss by disaggregating the cumulative extinction risk across species into components that can be attributed to certain threats. We devised and compared 3 metrics that accomplish this and may be used as indicators. The first metric calculates the portion of the temporal change in red list index (RLI) values that is caused by each threat. The second metric attributes the deviation of an RLI value from its reference value to different threats. The third metric uses extinction probabilities that are inferred from red list categories to estimate the contribution of a threat to the expected loss of species or ecosystems within 50 years. We used data from Norwegian Red Lists to test and evaluate these metrics. The first metric captured only a minor portion of the biodiversity loss caused by threats because it ignores species whose red list category does not change. Management authorities will often be interested in the contribution of a given threat to the total deviation from the optimal state. This was measured by the remaining metrics. The second metric was best suited for comparisons across countries or taxonomic groups. The third metric conveyed the same information but uses numbers of species or ecosystem as its unit, which is likely more intuitive to lay people and may be preferred when communicating with stakeholders or the general public.     

Evaluating the conservation impact of Antarctica's protected areas

Antarctic specially protected areas (ASPAs) are a key regulatory mechanism for protecting Antarctic environmental values. Previous evaluations of the effectiveness of the ASPA system focused on its representativeness and design characteristics, presenting a compelling rationale for its systematic revision. Upgrading the system could increase the representation of values within ASPAs, but representation alone does not guarantee the avoided loss or improvement of those values. Identifying factors that influence the effectiveness of ASPAs would inform the design and management of an ASPA system with the greatest capacity to deliver its intended conservation outcomes. To facilitate evaluations of ASPA effectiveness, we devised a research and policy agenda that includes articulating a theory of change for what outcomes ASPAs generate and how; building evaluation principles into ASPA design and designation processes; employing complementary approaches to evaluate multiple dimensions of effectiveness; and extending evaluation findings to identify and exploit drivers of positive conservation impact. Implementing these approaches will enhance the efficacy of ASPAs as a management tool, potentially leading to improved outcomes for Antarctic natural values in an era of rapid global change. Evaluación del impacto de conservación de las áreas protegidas de la Antártida     

Loss of an ecological baseline through the eradication of oyster reefs from coastal ecosystems and human memory

Oyster reefs form over extensive areas and the diversity and productivity of sheltered coasts depend on them. Due to the relatively recent population growth of coastal settlements in Australia, we were able to evaluate the collapse and extirpation of native oyster reefs (Ostrea angasi) over the course of a commercial fishery. We used historical records to quantify commercial catch of O. angasi in southern Australia from early colonization, around 1836, to some of the last recorded catches in 1944 and used our estimates of catch and effort to map their past distribution and assess oyster abundance over 180 years. Significant declines in catch and effort occurred from 1886 to 1946 and no native oyster reefs occur today, but historically oyster reefs extended across more than 1,500 km of coastline. That oyster reefs were characteristic of much of the coastline of South Australia from 1836 to 1910 appears not to be known because there is no contemporary consideration of their ecological and economic value. Based on the concept of a shifted baseline, we consider this contemporary state to reflect a collective, intergenerational amnesia. Our model of generational amnesia accounts for differences in intergenerational expectations of food, economic value, and ecosystem services of nearshore areas. An ecological system that once surrounded much of the coast and possibly the past presence of oyster reefs altogether may be forgotten and could not only undermine progress towards their recovery, but also reduce our expectations of these coastal ecosystems. La Pérdida de una Línea de Base Ecológica por Medio de la Erradicación de Arrecifes de Ostión de los Ecosistemas Costeros y la Memoria Humana     

Risk Assessment of Inbreeding and Outbreeding Depression in a Captive‐Breeding Program

Captive‐breeding programs can be implemented to preserve the genetic diversity of endangered populations such that the controlled release of captive‐bred individuals into the wild may promote recovery. A common difficulty, however, is that programs are founded with limited wild broodstock, and inbreeding can become increasingly difficult to avoid with successive generations in captivity. Program managers must choose between maintaining the genetic purity of populations, at the risk of inbreeding depression, or interbreeding populations, at the risk of outbreeding depression. We evaluate these relative risks in a captive‐breeding program for 3 endangered populations of Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar). In each of 2 years, we released juvenile F₁ and F₂ interpopulation hybrids, backcrosses, as well as inbred and noninbred within‐population crosstypes into 9 wild streams. Juvenile size and survival was quantified in each year. Few crosstype effects were observed, but interestingly, the relative fitness consequences of inbreeding and outbreeding varied from year to year. Temporal variation in environmental quality might have driven some of these annual differences, by exacerbating the importance of maternal effects on juvenile fitness in a year of low environmental quality and by affecting the severity of inbreeding depression differently in different years. Nonetheless, inbreeding was more consistently associated with a negative effect on fitness, whereas the consequences of outbreeding were less predictable. Considering the challenges associated with a sound risk assessment in the wild and given that the effect of inbreeding on fitness is relatively predictable, we suggest that risk can be weighted more strongly in terms of the probable outcome of outbreeding. Factors such as genetic similarities between populations and the number of generations in isolation can sometimes be used to assess outbreeding risk, in lieu of experimentation. Evaluación del Riesgo de Depresión por Endogamia y Exogamia en un Programa de Reproducción en Cautiverio     

Evaluating Children's Conservation Biology Learning at the Zoo

Millions of children visit zoos every year with parents or schools to encounter wildlife firsthand. Public conservation education is a requirement for membership in professional zoo associations. However, in recent years zoos have been criticized for failing to educate the public on conservation issues and related biological concepts, such as animal adaptation to habitats. I used matched pre‐ and postvisit mixed methods questionnaires to investigate the educational value of zoo visits for children aged 7–15 years. The questionnaires gathered qualitative data from these individuals, including zoo‐related thoughts and an annotated drawing of a habitat. A content analysis of these qualitative data produced the quantitative data reported in this article. I evaluated the relative learning outcomes of educator‐guided and unguided zoo visits at London Zoo, both in terms of learning about conservation biology (measured by annotated drawings) and changing attitudes toward wildlife conservation (measured using thought‐listing data). Forty‐one percent of educator‐guided visits and 34% of unguided visits resulted in conservation biology‐related learning. Negative changes in children's understanding of animals and their habitats were more prevalent in unguided zoo visits. Overall, my results show the potential educational value of visiting zoos for children. However, they also suggest that zoos’ standard unguided interpretive materials are insufficient for achieving the best outcomes for visiting children. These results support a theoretical model of conservation biology learning that frames conservation educators as toolmakers who develop conceptual resources to enhance children's understanding of science. Evaluación del Aprendizaje de Biología de la Conservación por Niños en el Zoológico Jensen