Mediterranean wetland conservation in the context of climate and land cover change

Roxanne Leberger,Henrique M Pereira,Elie Gaget,Carlos A Guerra,Anis Gwelmami,Thomas Galewski,Ilse R Geijzendorffer

doi:10.1007/s10113-020-01655-0

Abstract

Wetlands are known to support diverse and unique species assemblages. Globally, but particularly in the Mediterranean basin, they are threatened by climate change and natural habitat loss. Despite an alarming decline of wetlands over the last century, standardised and systematic site assessments at large scale do not exist. Here, we perform an integrated assessment of Mediterranean wetlands by evaluating the combination of wetland protection and anthropogenic pressures, namely climate and land cover change, and the subsequent impact on wintering waterbirds. We used a multivariate partial triadic analysis to quantify climate and land cover change for each site between 1990 and 2005. We found that wetland sites in the southeast of the Mediterranean basin combined low or no protection cover with the highest increases in temperature and losses in natural habitats. Despite these findings, these sites also lack observation data on biodiversity, which may underestimate the resulting impacts. However, there are examples where active conservation measurements contributed positively to slow down wetlands’ reduction. Biodiversity data coverage needs to be ensured, regularly updated, and extended across sites regardless of their protection level, to allow for the assessment of biodiversity trends. This should be further extended to include current investments in remote sensing approaches.

Highlights

Mediterranean wetlands are of major concern, experiencing an estimated 50% loss over the last century (Perennou et al 2012; Geijzendorffer et al 2018)
Our results indicate a decrease in precipitation in the southeast through the years (Fig. 1) which is consistent with an increase in drought events and reduction of water availability in this area, as detected by other studies (Mariotti et al 2008)
We demonstrated that within the Mediterranean basin, unprotected wetlands from the Middle East countries were the most exposed to climate changes

Summary

Introduction

Mediterranean wetlands are of major concern, experiencing an estimated 50% loss over the last century (Perennou et al 2012; Geijzendorffer et al 2018). The increase in land cover change and land-use intensity over the last 50 years is deteriorating wetlands (Cuttelod et al 2009), with future projections predicting a rise in human population density and additional loss of natural areas (Bradshaw and Brook 2014). These dynamics have severe implications for wetlands, among which a significant decline in avian species as well as consequences for human

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Discussion

Conclusion