- Leaders and decision-makers are recognizing the urgency of protecting the world’s remaining biodiversity, but investing in conservation requires these actors have access to reliable and actionable information about ongoing conservation projects.
- Mongabay is launching a series of stories called “Conservation Potential,” in which we investigate conservation efforts in high-priority biodiversity areas in tropical forests across the globe.
- To introduce this series, we look at what some experts say about where to prioritize biodiversity conservation, what are some popular approaches to conservation, and what makes conservation projects successful.
- Approaches to conservation vary according to priorities, and there are even debates over what it means to protect biodiversity. This introduction is not meant to be an exhaustive review of the dozens of plans and schemes for preserving biodiversity, but it offers a conceptual starting point for our series.
From microbes to meerkats, the wealth of species on Earth is the glue that holds the cycles of life together: producing food, regulating climate, building soil, maintaining ecosystems and more.
Tropical forests are some of the most diverse ecosystems on the planet, and scientists estimate that they have only described a small percentage of the species that live there. But forests are in trouble.
Between 2001 to 2021, an area of forest measuring roughly half the size of China (more than 437 million hectares, or 1.08 billion acres) was lost or destroyed across the planet, according to data from the University of Maryland available on Global Forest Watch.
In 2021 alone, tropical forests were destroyed at a rate of about 10 football fields per minute, amounting to 11.1 million hectares (27.4 million acres). Nearly a quarter of that loss was in primary rainforests.
With the planet plunged headlong into what many experts call the sixth mass extinction, leaders and decision-makers are recognizing the urgency of safeguarding the world’s remaining biodiversity for the sake of our own survival.
“Without species, there would be no air to breathe, no food to eat, no water to drink. There would be no human society at all,” writes Conservation International.
The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), underway this month in Montreal, Canada, will adopt new targets for conserving, restoring and managing biodiversity at many scales. Governments, NGOs, local communities, Indigenous People and the private sector (businesses and corporations) all have roles to play.
Investing in the creation, expansion or continued work of conservation requires these actors have access to reliable and actionable information about these projects. To help address this need, Mongabay is launching a series of stories called “Conservation Potential,” in which we investigate conservation efforts in high-priority biodiversity areas in tropical forests across the globe.
To introduce this series, we look at what some experts say about where to prioritize biodiversity conservation, what some popular approaches to conservation are, and what makes conservation projects successful.
Approaches to conservation vary according to priorities, and there are even debates over what it means to protect biodiversity. Is it about protecting the number of overall species in an area, the number of endemic species (those found only in a certain location), preserving distinct evolutionary lineages and traits or preserving the elements of diversity that benefit people?
This introduction is not meant to be an exhaustive review of the dozens of plans and schemes for preserving biodiversity, but it offers a conceptual starting point for this series. We anticipate that our own perspectives will evolve as the series continues.
Where should we prioritize biodiversity conservation?
Biodiversity hotspots
The concept of biodiversity hotspots was introduced in 1989 by the scientist Norman Meyer. This popular framework has been adopted by organizations such as Conservation International, which use it as a guiding principle for their investments.
To be designated as a biodiversity hotspot, a region must be uniquely diverse and threatened, with at least 1,500 endemic plant species, those found nowhere else on Earth, and must have 30% or less of its original vegetation. Globally, 36 areas meet these criteria.
According to Conservation International, these habitats represent only 2.5% of global land area but hold more than half of all endemic plants and roughly 43% of endemic bird, mammal, reptile and amphibian species.
The tropical Andes is considered the most diverse hotspot in the world — topping the list for species richness and endemism. Other hotspots include the East Melanesian Islands, the Guinean forests of West Africa, Madagascar and Indo-Burma.
However, one of the drawbacks of the biodiversity hotspot method is that many critically endangered species may not be covered in these areas. The method also doesn’t account for the cost of conservation.
Asking not just where, but also when and at what cost
In a study published in August in Nature, researchers addressed not just where to protect habitats but also in what order. These scientists calculated where we could protect the maximum number of additional plant species (plant species not already protected elsewhere) over a 50-year period, assuming a $1 billion per year budget.
“You can make a big difference in conserving our species with relatively modest investment by investing wisely,” Ian Luby, an economist with the U.S. Geological Survey and lead author of the study, told Mongabay.
The model included species overlap among regions, the existing degree of protection, deforestation rates, reforestation potential, species richness and conservation costs of ecoregions and how those costs rise with cumulative protection.
Some of the highest-priority areas for forest conservation were in and around New Guinea, including the rainforests of the Louisiade Archipelago, the Solomon Islands, the Huon Peninsula and southeastern Papua New Guinea.
“Say, we spend equally across every [eco]region, and then we do that for 50 years,” Luby said. “At the end we would ask, could we have done better? And the answer is yes.”
Their method focuses only on plant species, but according to Luby, “Plant biodiversity is the foundation of forest ecosystem productivity and resilience and defines the habitat for all other forest species. … As a baseline, if you protect forest plant biodiversity, you are well on your way to maintaining healthy ecosystems.”
Using “umbrella species” to cover general biodiversity
Along similar lines, some groups have focused conservation efforts on one group of organisms, such as birds, trees or big cats. They reason that protecting that group and its habitat will also protect the other organisms in the ecosystem. This can also be a marketing strategy, as it may be easier to get people to care about birds than bogs.
For nearly 50 years, BirdLife International has identified places it calls Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas (IBAs), areas that birds and the wildlife they depend on need to survive. Its list of more than 13,000 places in 200 countries covers about 7% of terrestrial land. Protecting these places, the group says, ensures the survival of many other species.
“Because some places are much richer in biodiversity than others, conserving a relatively modest network of sites is a cost-effective and efficient way of ensuring the survival of a large number of species,” states the Birdlife International website.
Another recent study investigated the worldwide protection of tree species and found that 13% have no protection at all.
The researchers calculated the most suitable locations of potential protected areas needed to safeguard tree species diversity, not only concerning the coverage of species but also their evolutionary and functional differences. They found that the existing conservation plan that would most effectively protect tree diversity is The Global 200, a list of ecoregions identified by WWF as priorities for the conservation of plant and animal biodiversity.
Global safety net
The Global Safety Net (GSN) is an interactive, online tool to support conservation and land use planning. In addition to mapping current protected areas, the GSN maps additional unprotected areas needed to conserve sites of species rarity, distinct species assemblages, rare phenomena (such as areas containing the last intact large mammal assemblages) and intact ecosystems.
According to GSN, 50 ecoregions in 20 countries, a big part of which are also Indigenous territories, contribute disproportionately to biodiversity and climate targets. Further, GSN says that conserving these areas “could support public health by reducing the potential for zoonotic diseases like COVID-19 from emerging in the future.”
IUCN Red List of Ecosystems
Another approach is to consider ecosystems as a whole and protect those ecosystems that are most at risk of vanishing completely. The IUCN List of Threatened Species is the standard for assessing the conservation status of animal and plant species, determining which are at risk of extinction. Similarly, The IUCN Red List of Ecosystems is a tool to assess the conservation status of ecosystems at risk of collapsing.
On the Red List, 71 tropical forest ecosystems are listed as Critically Endangered, on the brink of collapse. These include the Western Ecuador humid forests, the Caatinga Seasonal dry forests of Brazil and the Bago semi-evergreen forests and the southern Rakhine evergreen rainforests of Myanmar. Data on forests in the global south, particularly in Africa, are lacking.
What are some approaches to biodiversity conservation?
Conservation takes many forms. Most are familiar with large government-designated protected areas such as national parks, but forests can also be protected by private reserves and ownership, community ownership or by the designation of Indigenous territories or granting land rights to Indigenous people.
An estimated 36% of ecologically intact forests and 80% of the planet’s biodiversity lie within Indigenous peoples’ territories, so securing Indigenous communities’ land rights can be an equitable, low-cost and effective way to protect the environment.
“When thinking about how to invest this money,” Luby said, “often local groups and Indigenous people have the best sense of where and what will get the best return for conservation.”
Another effective method for promoting conservation is to root out the causes of forest destruction, which are often economic. On a local scale, this may mean providing or strengthening economic alternatives to activities such as mining, logging, poaching and clearing forests for agriculture. Some alternatives are ecotourism, agroforestry, handicraft sales or optimizing agriculture on already cleared lands.
Active reforestation efforts are another conservation approach that can also support local communities. For example, local families in Brazil’s Atlantic Forest planted trees on about 10% of the total farm area adjacent to existing forest fragments and rivers. This created buffer zones for forests and connectivity for wildlife, revitalizing the critically endangered primate species, the black lion tamarin.
Beyond the tremendous outcome for wildlife, the new forest patches became a source of useful forest products, such as fruits and fodder that families could use, eat or sell. These tree-planting and agroforestry projects also created a demand for tree seedlings and a thriving industry of local plant nurseries.
“The restoration process is a strong tool in generating income,” Laury Cullen Jr., now the project and research coordinator of IPÊ, the Brazilian nonprofit that organized the local communities, told Mongabay. “For every 1,000 hectares [2,470 acres] restored, we generate 100 direct jobs. It’s a lot of people involved. For every $1 million invested in planting native forests, we generate 30 direct jobs. This is five times more than the oil and gas industry, for example.”
A 2021 UN report makes an economic case for restoration as an investment, noting that for every dollar that goes into restoration, up to $30 in economic benefits are created, promoting food security, clean water, health, climate change mitigation, security and more.
Many argue that protecting intact forests should take precedence over reforestation, but in some cases, the actions are complementary. For example, restoration can create corridors that connect critical habitats and restoring tree cover can protect headwaters, with benefits to the entire watershed.
“There’s no single approach you can say is better than another,” Jessica Chalmers, director of partnerships at WeForest, told Mongabay. “It all just depends on where you are. It depends on the context.”
Research on biodiversity is lacking in some regions of the world, notably the Global South, so schemes that rely on data alone may miss some of the world’s most unique and diverse species. For example, it was only recently uncovered by Western science that New Guinea has the most plant species of any island.
It must also be noted that conservation, in the Western sense, follows a legacy of racism and colonialism. Area-based conservation schemes that call for protecting a certain percentage of the planet (such as the 30×30 Initiative and the Half-Earth Project) have come under criticism for discounting the people who actually live in these places.
What makes conservation successful?
Mongabay laid out key questions for funders to ask when vetting a reforestation or tree-planting project, and many of these are applicable to other kinds of conservation projects such as: Who is participating? Is the community involved? Who is benefitting? Does it have a gender component? Will there be follow-up and monitoring?
For restoration projects, Forest Landscape Restoration Principles are widely heralded as the gold standard. This approach centers the people who depend on the forest, aiming to restore the function of ecosystems while enhancing human well‐being. Conservation measures based on protecting intact forests and boosting economic alternatives follow many of the same themes, and community is often at the heart of success.
Including local people, understanding who the stakeholders are and ensuring they are all involved and represented from the beginning are crucial to success. In a survey of global restoration projects, researchers found that conflicting goals between local communities and project managers were the most common cause of project failures and problems.
“If [local communities’] needs are heard and taken into consideration, and they are informed about the environmental issues the project is addressing, they are more likely to support the project and help to deliver successful outcomes in the long term,” according to the study “Ten Golden Rules for Reforestation to Optimise Carbon Sequestration, Biodiversity Recovery and Livelihood Benefits” published by the Royal Botanical Gardens, Kew, and partners in January 2021.
Gender is also an important component. Projects that involve women and address gender from the planning and design stages have better outcomes, according to a 2017 report on gender and sustainable forest management.
Conservation occurs at many scales, so the support of governments from national to local is also the key to success. Support from the government means not only the designation of a protected area but also funding for effective management and protection.
At the same time, governments can be fickle, and in some countries, the official status of a protected area can be changed with a change of administration. Enduring conservation is often led by people who rely on and have a vested interest in the land they protect. Conservation takes endurance; that is why Indigenous and local communities are often the most effective stewards of lasting conservation.
Conclusion
Halting deforestation and conserving what remains of the world’s forests is a key part of not only safeguarding biodiversity but also slowing climate change and keeping critical ecosystem services such as flood control, water filtration and pollination afloat. A 2014 study valued global ecosystem services at $125 trillion a year.
However, many high-priority conservation areas fall within lower-income tropical countries, those that are rich in biodiversity but poorer financially, so substantial international funding, likely from the world’s wealthiest countries and corporations, is needed to conserve and restore forests.
These resources are available. The $1 billion per year conservation budget modeled in Luby et. al. 2022 is a relatively small percentage of the combined GDPs of wealthier nations and the world’s largest companies and their CEOs. (In 2021, the US GDP was $23 trillion. Elon Musk recently bought Twitter for $44 billion.) However, experts say investments in nature may require a shift in the way nature is valued.
“Biodiversity is being lost and nature’s contributions to people are being degraded faster now than at any other point in human history,” said Ana María Hernández Salgar, chair of Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) in a statement. “This is largely because our current approach to political and economic decisions does not sufficiently account for the diversity of nature’s values.”
“Governments need to negotiate for conservation and not against it,” Susan Lieberman, vice president of international policy for the Wildlife Conservation Society said in a statement. “Our future and that of our planet [are] in the balance.”
View the first in the Conservation Potential series here:
In Ecuador, communities protecting a ‘terrestrial coral reef’ face a mining giant
Citations:
Chazdon, R. L., Cullen Jr, L., Padua, S. M., & Padua, C. V. (2020). People, primates and predators in the Pontal: From endangered species conservation to forest and landscape restoration in Brazil’s Atlantic Forest. Royal Society Open Science, 7(12), 200939. doi:10.1098/rsos.200939
Luby, I. H., Miller, S. J., & Polasky, S. (2022). When and where to protect forests. Nature, 1-5. doi:10.1038/s41586-022-05096-z
Guo, W. Y., Serra-Diaz, J. M., Schrodt, F., Eiserhardt, W. L., Maitner, B. S., Merow, C., … Svenning, J. C. (2022). High exposure of global tree diversity to human pressure. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 119(25), e2026733119. doi:10.1073/pnas.2026733119
Di Sacco, A., Hardwick, K. A., Blakesley, D., Brancalion, P. H., Breman, E., Cecilio Rebola, L., … & Antonelli, A. (2021). Ten golden rules for reforestation to optimize carbon sequestration, biodiversity recovery and livelihood benefits. Global Change Biology, 27(7), 1328-1348. https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.15498
Höhl, M., Ahimbisibwe, V., Stanturf, J. A., Elsasser, P., Kleine, M., & Bolte, A. (2020). Forest landscape restoration—what generates failure and success?. Forests, 11(9), 938. https://doi.org/10.3390/f11090938
Myers, N., Mittermeier, R. A., Mittermeier, C. G., Da Fonseca, G. A., & Kent, J. (2000). Biodiversity hotspots for conservation priorities. Nature, 403(6772), 853-858. DOI: 10.1038/35002501
Costanza, R., De Groot, R., Sutton, P., Van der Ploeg, S., Anderson, S. J., Kubiszewski, I., … & Turner, R. K. (2014). Changes in the global value of ecosystem services. Global environmental change, 26, 152-158. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2014.04.002
Guo, W. Y., Serra-Diaz, J. M., Schrodt, F., Eiserhardt, W. L., Maitner, B. S., Merow, C., … Svenning, J. C. (2022). High exposure of global tree diversity to human pressure. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 119(25), e2026733119. doi:10.1073/pnas.2026733119
Liz Kimbrough is a staff writer for Mongabay. Find her on Twitter: @lizkimbrough_
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