Expansion Of Protected Areas Research Articles

Priority areas for thein situconservation of crop wild relatives in South Africa

AbstractCrop wild relatives (CWR) are wild plant taxa that have broader genetic diversity than crops hence they are an excellent source of genes and traits to improve crops. The potential value of CWR for agriculture and the need to protect these plants in their natural habitats (in situ) have been recognized globally. South Africa has the richest temperate flora globally, and the checklist of food and fodder CWR for the country considers 258 taxa to be high priority for conservation. A systematic conservation planning approach was used for spatial prioritization forin situconservation actions for CWR. Protected areas were categorized on the basis of their CWR richness. The Kruger National Park has the highest number of CWR (66 taxa), but most of these are widespread and common. Fifty-seven protected areas, most of which are in the Western and Eastern Cape fynbos, are irreplaceable for protecting a number of endemic and threatened CWR. For priority CWR not adequately represented in existing protected areas, a spatial plan was developed to identify the smallest area that aligns with existing targets for the National Protected Areas Expansion Strategy, that are not transformed in terms of habitat, and that are projected to be climate change resilient. Mechanisms for ensuring uptake of the recommendations for thein situconservation of CWR have been documented in a National Strategy and Action Plan and these include making information and data available and promoting the inclusion of CWR in current management and monitoring activities.

Identifying and categorizing stakeholders for protected area expansion around a national park in Namibia

CITATION: Mannetti, L. M., et al. 2019. Identifying and categorizing stakeholders for protected area expansion around a national park in Namibia. Ecology and Society, 24(2). doi:10.5751/ES-10790-240205

Conservation gaps and priorities in the Tropical Andes biodiversity hotspot: Implications for the expansion of protected areas

The Tropical Andes (TA) contain some of the most important and threatened areas for biodiversity conservation on earth. Despite the proportion of protected areas (PAs) that currently cover the TA, it is unknown if these areas are adequately protecting the biodiversity throughout the region and where the expansion of PAs is most needed to preserve biodiversity in the future. Here, we examine the conservation status of 1743 vertebrate species endemic to the TA (including mammals, birds, amphibians and reptiles), for which conservation actions should be prioritized within the region itself. Using species' geographical range maps, refined by their known elevational and habitat requirements, we carry out a gap analysis to examine to what degree endemic vertebrate species in the TA are represented by PAs. Then, using the irreplaceability-vulnerability framework, we localize first and second priority areas for conservation action, where important ecological features are subjected to severe anthropogenic disturbance. Our results show that 72% of all species and 90% of all threatened species are insufficiently covered by PAs. Furthermore, 73% of the first priority sites and 84% of the second priority sites are not covered by current PAs. These areas are predominantly located in the surroundings of major population centers in Ecuador and Colombia. To prevent species from extinction in the near future, actions to conserve their remaining habitat in prioritized areas are urgently required.

Corridors of Power: Assembling US Environmental Foreign Aid

AbstractUsing the US Agency for International Development's environmental program in Madagascar as a lens, I offer a historically grounded, relational, and multi‐sited methodology for understanding the transnational processes that constitute political forests in the contemporary era. I argue that neoliberal reforms conditioned the emergence of a public–private–non‐profit alliance, which promoted biodiversity conservation as a US foreign aid priority. As these reforms weakened state capacity and liberalised economies, the downsized Madagascar and US governments became reliant on conservation actors to mobilise political support for their programs. This reinforced the need to maintain strategic relationships with capital‐city actors, undermining prior efforts to devolve forest management to local communities. By isolating deforestation as a peasant problem “over there” and by expanding protected areas to meet global biodiversity targets, the conservation alliance created an avenue to be green that did not threaten extractive industries or key constituents. In this manner, saving the environment via protected areas expansion offered politicians a pathway through the inherent contradictions of green neoliberalism.

Context and Opportunities for Expanding Protected Areas in Canada

At present, 10.5% of Canada’s land base is under some form of formal protection. Recent developments indicate Canada aims to work towards a target of protecting 17% of its terrestrial and inland water area by 2020. Canada is uniquely positioned globally as one of the few nations that has the capacity to expand the area under its protection. In addition to its formally protected areas, Canada’s remote regions form de facto protected areas that are relatively free from development pressure. Opportunities for expansion of formally protected areas in Canada include official delineation and designation of de facto protected areas and the identification and protection of land to improve connectivity between protected areas (PAs). Furthermore, there are collaborative opportunities for expanding PA through commitments from industry and provincial and territorial land stewards. Other collaborative opportunities include the contributions of First Nations aligning with international examples of Indigenous Protected Areas, or the incorporation and cultivation of private protection programs with documented inclusion in official PA networks. A series of incremental additions from multiple actors may increase the likelihood for achieving area-based targets, and expands stakeholder engagement and representation in Canada’s PA system. Given a generational opportunity and high-level interest in expansion of protected areas in Canada and elsewhere, it is evident that as a diverse number of stakeholders and rights holders collaboratively map current and future land uses onto forest landscapes, science-based conservation targets and spatial prioritizations can inform this process.

Managing birds of conservation concern on sandy shores: How much room for future conservation actions is there?

Resource limitations often prevent the active management required to maintain habitat quality in protected areas. Because restrictions in access or allowable public activities are the sole conservation measure in these locations, an important question to consider is whether species of conservation concern truly benefit from parcels that are shielded from human disturbance. Here, we assess the conservation benefit of protecting birds from human recreation on over 204 km of sandy beaches by (a) estimating the total area of beach‐nesting bird habitat that has been created by conservation protections; (b) quantifying the change in nesting habitat extent should further conservation protections be implemented; and (c) providing data to inform future protected area expansion. We use a maximum entropy species distribution modeling approach to estimate the extent and quality of suitable habitat for four beach‐nesting bird species of conservation concern under the existing management regime and compare it to scenarios in which the entire study area is either unprotected of fully protected from human disturbance. Managing humans has dramatic conservation returns for least terns and piping plovers, creating extensive nesting habitat that otherwise would not exist. There is considerable scope for conservation gains, potentially tripling the extent of nesting areas. Expanding conservation footprints for American oystercatchers and black skimmers is predicted to enhance the quality of existing nesting areas. The work demonstrates the utility of modeling changes in habitat suitability to inform protected area expansion on ocean beaches and coastal dunes.

Estratégias relacionadas à conservação ambiental em reservas particulares no Mato Grosso do Sul, Brasil

Iniciativas voltadas para conservação de Áreas Protegidas (APs) se destacam como ações essenciais para a proteção do ambiente natural e seus elementos. O estudo tem como objetivo analisar estratégias relacionadas à conservação ambiental nas Reservas Particulares do Patrimônio Natural (RPPNs) Quinta do Sol e Vale do Bugio, Mato Grosso do Sul. A pesquisa foi conduzida a partir de uma abordagem qualiquantitativa e multidisciplinar. Verificou-se também 12 variáveis como indicadores de sustentabilidade ambiental, compatíveis com as duas reservas. A propagação das estratégias relacionadas à conservação ambiental utilizadas por essas reservas pode contribuir de forma significativa para a expansão de novas áreas protegidas em regiões importantes, como é o caso da Serra de Maracaju, área prioritária para conservação da biodiversidade.

Contrasting associations between habitat conditions and stream aquatic biodiversity in a forest reserve and its surrounding area in the Eastern Amazon

Streams of protected areas should be subjected to less environmental degradation than surrounding areas and consequently support greater aquatic biodiversity. To test this, 186 environmental and landscape variables were measured in 34 streams within the Caxiuana National Forest (CNF) and its surrounding zone in the eastern Amazon. We expected that streams inside the CNF protected area would have more riparian forest cover and large woody debris (LWD) that increase instream habitat complexity and aquatic biodiversity. Several environmental variables differed between streams in the CNF and surrounding zone; however, the major difference was greater LWD, leaf litter, and channel depth in CNF streams. Richness of fish, Chironomidae, EPT (Ephemeroptera + Plecoptera + Trichoptera), and all-groups combined were positively associated with LWD. Assemblage taxonomic composition was correlated with several variables, but most groups revealed no clear differentiation between the two areas. This lack of differentiation may be explained by relatively minor environmental impacts in areas surrounding the CNF given the region’s small human population. The most notable impact to streams outside of the CNF was removal of LWD to facilitate boat passage. To conserve aquatic biodiversity, we recommend expansion of protected areas and adoption of policies governing land use in surrounding zones.

How to protect half of Earth to ensure it protects sufficient biodiversity.

It is theoretically possible to protect large fractions of species in relatively small regions. For plants, 85% of species occur entirely within just over a third of the Earth's land surface, carefully optimized to maximize the species captured. Well-known vertebrate taxa show similar patterns. Protecting half of Earth might not be necessary, but would it be sufficient given the current trends of protection? The predilection of national governments is to protect areas that are "wild," that is, typically remote, cold, or arid. Unfortunately, those areas often hold relatively few species. Wild places likely afford the easier opportunities for the future expansion of protected areas, with the expansion into human-dominated landscapes the greater challenge. We identify regions that are not currently protected, but that are wild, and consider which of them hold substantial numbers of especially small-ranged vertebrate species. We assess how successful the strategy of protecting the wilder half of Earth might be in conserving biodiversity. It is far from sufficient. (Protecting large wild places for reasons other than biodiversity protection, such as carbon sequestration and other ecosystem services, might still have importance.) Unexpectedly, we also show that, despite the bias in establishing large protected areas in wild places to date, numerous small protected areas are in biodiverse places. They at least partially protect significant fractions of especially small-ranged species. So, while a preoccupation with protecting large areas for the sake of getting half of Earth might achieve little for biodiversity, there is more progress in protecting high-biodiversity areas than currently appreciated. Continuing to prioritize the right parts of Earth, not just the total area protected, is what matters for biodiversity.

Saying “No” to (the) Oxygen Capital? Amenity migration, counter-territorialization, and uneven rural landscape change in the Kaz Dağları (Ida Mountains) of western Turkey

Diverse forms of conservation and development are transforming the material landscapes and related livelihoods of communities in rural places around the world. While many studies focus on changing protected area governance and ecotourism efforts associated with nature protection, other studies focus on residential development in areas experiencing amenity migration. We use a comparative political ecology approach that draws on key insights from the political ecology literature, first, on neoliberal protected area expansion, and, second, on exurbia that highlight the dynamics of competing rural capitalisms and reterritorializtion in areas experiencing amenity migration to explore these coupled conservation and development dynamics. Drawing on the case of the Kazdağları (Ida Mountains) along the Bay of Edremit in western Turkey, we examine how changing environmental governance associated with the region's national park created key conditions for the emergence of new real estate dynamics that supported amenity-related development in some villages. Yet our research also uncovers further uneven rural landscape changes and divergent outcomes associated with this reterritorialization process. Our findings suggest the presence of counter-territorialization dynamics, or the efforts of culturally distinctive villages in rural areas to resist these landscape changes. In the Kazdağları, selective strategies of engagement and non-engagement with the real estate market contribute to these divergent outcomes. To protect their cultural identity, villagers commodify particular landscape features, which enable these counter-territorializaton efforts to succeed. These findings hold insights for efforts to understand landscape patterns in rural areas characterized by changing protected area governance, high levels of natural amenity attracting in-migrants, and settlements with distinctive cultural identities.

Multi-scale multi-level marine spatial planning: A novel methodological approach applied in South Africa.

This study proposes and discusses a multi-scale spatial planning method implemented simultaneously at local and national level to prioritize ecosystem management actions across landscapes and seascapes. Mismatches in scale between the occurrence of biodiversity patterns and ecological processes, and the size and nature of the human footprint, and the different levels and scope of governance, are a significant challenge in conservation planning. These scale mismatches are further confounded by data resolution disparities across and amongst the different scales. To address this challenge, we developed a multi-resolution scale-linked marine spatial planning method. We tested this approach in the development of a Conservation Plan for a significant portion of South Africa’s exclusive economic zone, adjacent to the east coast province of KwaZulu-Natal (the SeaPlan project). The study’s dataset integrated the geographic distribution of 390 biodiversity elements (species, habitats, and oceanographic processes) and 38 human activities. A multi-resolution system of planning unit layers (PUL), with individual PUs ranging in resolution from 0.2 to 10 km, was designed to arrange and analyse these data. Spatial priorities for conservation were selected incrementally at different scales, contributing conservation targets from the fine-, medium- and large-scale analyses, and from the coast to the offshore. Compared to a basic single-resolution scale-unlinked plan, our multi-resolution scale-linked method selects 6% less conservation area to achieve the same targets. Compared to a multi-resolution scale-unlinked plan, our method requires only an additional 5% area. Overall, this method reflects the multi-scale nature of marine social-ecological systems more realistically, is relatively simple and replicable, and serves to better connect fine-scale and large-scale spatial management policies. We discuss the impacts of this study on protected area expansion planning processes in South Africa. This study showcases a methodological advance that has the potential to impact marine spatial planning practices and policies.

Poor ecological representation by an expensive reserve system: Evaluating 35 years of marine protected area expansion

AbstractGlobal areal protection targets have driven a dramatic expansion of the marine protected area (MPA) estate. We analyzed how cost‐effective global MPA expansion has been since the inception of the first global target (set in 1982) in achieving ecoregional representation. By comparing spatial patterns of MPA expansion against optimal MPA estates using the same expansion rates, we show the current MPA estate is both expensive and ineffective. Although the number of ecoregions represented tripled and 12.7% of national waters was protected, 61% of ecoregions and 81% of countries are not 10% protected. Only 10.3% of the national waters of the world would be sufficient to protect 10% of each ecoregion if MPA growth since 1982 strategically targeted underrepresented ecoregions. Unfortunately 16.3% of national waters are required for the same representative target if systematic protection started in 2016 (an extra 3.6% on top of 12.7%). To avoid the high costs of adjusting increasingly biased MPA systems, future efforts should embrace target‐driven systematic conservation planning.

Evolutionary history of campo rupestre: an approach for conservation of woody plant communities

The campo rupestre sensu lato is among the most species-rich vegetation in the world, harbouring a high proportion of endemic species. We aimed to identify the processes that could generate a high level of phylogenetic diversity (PD) in campo rupestre for woody species and point out biodiversity hotspot areas which may provide additional information for conservation planning. We compiled a database of 2049 woody species from 185 community inventories. We calculated the evolutionary history using species richness (SR), PD, mean pairwise phylogenetic distance between species (MPD), the mean nearest taxon distance (MNTD) and their equivalents standardised (ses.PDss, ses.MPD, ses.MNTD), evolutionary distinctiveness (ED), and biogeographically weighted evolutionary distinctiveness (BED). Cloud dwarf-forests had the highest SR, PD, MPD and ses.MPD and lowest MNTD, while rupestrian cerrado presented the highest ses.PD and ses.MNTD. All areas are important for conservation, but the intersections between the hotspots should receive special attention in future conservation actions. The grids identified as hotspots by three or more metrics were localized mainly in Espinhaco Range in Minas Gerais State and a further expansion of protected areas is required. Moreover, the intersections between the hotspots obtained by mean ED and ses.PD are concentrated in the rocky dwarf forest and rupestrian cerrado, with considerable conservation gaps. The degree of protection of campo rupestre was low with unprotected areas comprising 56% of the species. Our results show an urgent need for increasing protected areas of campo rupestre in order to avoid the loss of valuable, endemic species with unique evolutionary history.

Ground-dwelling spider assemblages in contrasting habitats in the central South African Grassland Biome

Background: Ground-dwelling spider assemblages in shrublands and cultivated pastures in the South African Grassland Biome have never been comprehensively studied.Objectives: Epigeic spiders were collected in eight different habitats in the Amanzi Private Game Reserve in the Free State to determine assemblages of different vegetation types.Methods: Three of the sampled habitats were contrasting low-lying shrublands; three were contrasting hill aspects (northern slope, southern slope and plateau) in the Buddleja saligna–Searsia burchellii–Olea europaea africana subcommunity; one habitat was cultivated Digitaria eriantha pastures, and the last habitat was an area in and around a freshwater dam. Spiders were sampled by pitfall trapping in early spring (Sept. 2012), mid-summer (Jan. 2013), mid-autumn (Apr. 2013) and mid-winter (July 2013).Results: A total of 2982 adult spiders were collected, representing 129 species and 33 families. Ammoxenidae was the most abundant family (40.85%), followed by Gnaphosidae (21.26%), Zodariidae (10.80%) and Salticidae (10.26%). Gnaphosidae was the most species-rich family (24.81%), followed by Salticidae (13.18%), Lycosidae (11.63%) and Zodariidae (6.20%). Spider activity densities and species richness did not differ significantly between habitats, although significant seasonal fluctuations were detected. The three hill aspects and cultivated D. eriantha pastures had the most distinct assemblages, while those of the three low-lying shrublands and freshwater dam showed considerable overlap.Conclusions: Our results indicate that the aspect of hills has a significant effect in shaping spider assemblages, while the vegetation composition of shrublands is not strongly influential. The unique spider assemblages of cultivated D. eriantha pastures can be attributed to the absence of woody plants.Conservation implications: This was the first study to investigate ground-dwelling spider assemblages in shrublands and cultivated pastures in the South African Grassland Biome. Our study confirms that hill aspects, shrublands and pastures harbour very different spider faunas. When identifying land for potential expansion or establishment of protected areas, conservation planners should ensure that the greatest diversity of vegetation units are included to optimise the conservation of biodiversity.

Species richness, geographic distribution, pressures, and threats to bats in the Caatinga drylands of Brazil

Tropical dry forests (TDF) are threatened worldwide, affected by conversion to agriculture, fragmentation, fires, and climate change. Most of the remaining TDF are in South America, including Brazil's Caatinga. Understanding how the biota of TDFs responds to habitat loss and climate change is a scientific challenge, especially to diversified groups, such as bats, whose richness and ecological roles in TDF are usually underestimated. We updated and synthesized occurrence data and generated distribution models for Caatinga bats considering present and future scenarios. At least 96 species, 48 genera, and eight families were recorded, including two endemic species; five additional species may occur in the biome. The highest potential species richness occurs in the east, in the Caatinga/Atlantic Forest ecotone; the lowest in the west, in the Caatinga/Cerrado ecotone. Current and projected deforestation led to a reduction of 65% in areas with very high potential richness, and only 0.4% will remain within current protected areas. In a business as usual scenario (i.e., high and fast habitat loss + low in situ protection + high potential exposure to climate change) the bat fauna of the Caatinga will be negatively impacted. Improving the conservation of roosting and foraging sites, with the expansion and/or creation of protected areas is urgently needed.

Compliance to Brazil's Forest Code will not protect biodiversity and ecosystem services

AbstractIn striking contrast to heartening events in the adjacent Amazon, Brazil's Cerrado biome has seen continued deforestation over the past decade. Though approved in 2012, no study evaluated the impacts of new Brazilian Forest Code (FC) revision on biodiversity and ecosystem services. Here, we report the first assessment of the likely loss and gain in biodiversity and ecosystem services expected if the FC is properly enforced across 200 million hectares of the Cerrado. We also discuss the challenges associated to compliance with the law and present opportunities for conservation. Establishing restoration programmes in private properties with currently less native vegetation than required by the FC could create habitat for 25% more threatened species than now found in these places and could also increase water security and carbon stock in 56.6 MtC. More important, trading environmental reserve quotas coupled with the strategic expansion of protected areas on private and public land could definitely rescue the Cerrado from the brink.

The conservation costs and economic benefits of using biodiversity offsets to meet international targets for protected area expansion

AbstractAichi Biodiversity Target 11 under the Convention on Biological Diversity sets out to conserve at least 17% of terrestrial area by 2020. However, few countries are on track to meet this target and it is uncertain whether developing countries have allocated sufficient resources to expand their protected areas. Biodiversity offsets could resolve this conservation shortfall if developers who affect biodiversity negatively at one locality are made responsible for its protection elsewhere. Here we simulate the use of biodiversity offsetting to expand protected area coverage in South Africa's grassland biome. South Africa's biodiversity offsets policy has been designed specifically to compensate for the residual loss of biodiversity caused by development, by establishing and managing protected areas within the same ecosystem type. We show that it is possible to meet protected area targets using only offsets, while facilitating economic development. However, doing so could slash the current extent of intact habitat by half. These losses could be reduced considerably should the gains in protected areas through offsetting supplement rather than supplant existing government commitments to protected area expansion. Moreover, supplementing existing government commitments would result in comparatively small reductions in potential economic gains, because the marginal economic benefit of transforming habitat decreases as more intact habitat is lost. Therefore, the intended role of biodiversity offsetting in achieving a country's protected area target should be made explicit to fully understand the associated trade-offs between conservation and economic development.

Green and socioeconomic infrastructures in the Brazilian Amazon: implications for a changing climate

Amazonia is one of the world’s most vulnerable regions to climate change but few studies pinpointing priority areas for local adaptation programmes exist. This paper aims to identify socio-climatic hotspots among the 515 municipalities that compose the Brazilian Amazon by using a three-step process. First, we identified the regional social hotspots, that is, municipalities that have currently low adaptive capacity, by calculating a composite infrastructure index based on the assessment of both current green and socioeconomic infrastructures. Second, we used a Regional Climate Change Index to identify the climate change hotspots, that is, those municipalities that have a high likelihood to experience future climate change risks. Third, we evaluated the geographic coincidence of social and climate change hotspots to identify the socio-climatic hotspots. We found that 117 municipalities are regional social hotspots and that 60 municipalities are regional climate change hotspots. Forty-six municipalities are considered as socio-climatic hotspots because they have very low to low composite infrastructure indices and very high climate risk indices. Local institutional capacity to integrate and execute national-level policies that enhance local adaptive capacity is a major constraint across the region. To face the challenges associated with climate change, municipalities in the Brazilian Amazon should embrace a more sustainable development model. Sustainable development, in the context of the Brazilian Amazon, implies conservation of the existing green infrastructure through the expansion of protected areas and indigenous lands, restoration of green infrastructure in areas of deficit, and substantial investments in urban socioeconomic infrastructures to foster a knowledge-based economy. Although local sustainable development and adaptation plans are essential across the entire region, the 46 municipalities identified in this study as regional socio-climatic hotspots could be prioritized for action.

The conservation status of African vertebrates is unrelated to environmental and spatial patterns in their geographic ranges

Statistical predictions of the impact of climate change on biodiversity assume that the environmental and spatial characteristics of contemporary species’ distributions reflect the conditions needed for their continued and prolonged existence. Here we explore this assumption by testing whether a species’ threatened status is associated with the amount of variation in its distribution range attributable to environmental and spatial patterns. Using a variation partitioning approach, we decomposed variation in the distribution ranges of 4423 vertebrate species in sub-Saharan Africa into components attributable exclusively to environmental variables (E|S), exclusively to spatial variables (S|E) or to the collinearity between environmental and spatial variables (E∩S). We found that species’ threatened status was unrelated to E|S, S|E or E∩S variation components, but that unexplained variation was higher for species threatened with extinction. This suggests that spatio-environmental patterns in species’ ranges likely underestimate the overall extinction threat caused by climate change. We also found clear geographic patterns in the strength of E|S, S|E or E∩S that differed amongst biogeographical regions, but no component was over- or underrepresented in the present-day protected area network. While there may be benefits to tailoring protected area expansion to differences between biogeographical regions, this should aim to incorporate species-specific information wherever possible.

Biodiversity, threats and conservation challenges in the Cerrado of Amapá, an Amazonian savanna

An Amazonian savanna in northern Brazil known as the Cerrado of Amapa is under imminent threat from poor land-use planning, the expansion of large-scale agriculture and other anthropogenic pressures. These savannas house a rich and unique flora and fauna, including endemic plants and animals. However, the area remains under-sampled for most taxa, and better sampling may uncover new species. We estimate that only ~9.16% of these habitats have any kind of protection, and legislative changes threaten to further weaken or remove this protection. Here we present the status of knowledge concerning the biodiversity of the Cerrado of Amapa, its conservation status, and the main threats to the conservation of this Amazonian savanna. To secure the future of these unique and imperilled habitats, we suggest urgent expansion of protected areas, as well as measures that would promote less-damaging land uses to support the local population.