Areas of global importance for conserving terrestrial biodiversity, carbon and water

Abstract

To meet the ambitious objectives of biodiversity and climate conventions, countries and the international community require clarity on how these objectives can be operationalized spatially, and multiple targets be pursued concurrently 1 . To support governments and political conventions, spatial guidance is needed to identify which areas should be managed for conservation to generate the greatest synergies between biodiversity and nature's contribution to people (NCP). Here we present results from a joint optimization that maximizes improvements in species conservation status, carbon retention and water provisioning and rank terrestrial conservation priorities globally. We found that, selecting the top-ranked 30% (respectively 50%) of areas would conserve 62.4% (86.8%) of the estimated total carbon stock and 67.8% (90.7%) of all clean water provisioning, in addition to improving the conservation status for 69.7% (83.8%) of all species considered. If priority was given to biodiversity only, managing 30% of optimally located land area for conservation may be sufficient to improve the conservation status of 86.3% of plant and vertebrate species on Earth. Our results provide a global baseline on where land could be managed for conservation. We discuss how such a spatial prioritisation framework can support the implementation of the biodiversity and climate conventions.

Ecological redlines provide a mechanism to maximize conservation gains in Mainland Southeast Asia

“…This advances from other frameworks in several major ways. Firstly, while other frameworks have explored co-benefits between biodiversity conservation and carbon sequestration for climate goals, and to an extent water retention, 24 we have broadened this to include other key indicators of service provision. Secondly, while many approaches are coarse, especially at the global scale, we have downscaled targets and analysis to a more ecologically meaningful scale (250 m) that better reflects priorities, especially in heterogeneous regions.…”

“…Various other approaches have been used for the identification of priorities for conservation and management. For example, a recent analysis on global ecological hotspots 24 indicates that the first 10% ecological priority covers 46.1% of all species hotspots, 27.1% of the total carbon, and 24.1% of the potential clean water globally, and it also explores trade-offs and synergies between three type of indicators (ecosystem services; ecosystem sensitivity and biological richness) to develop protection targets. Yet, some ecosystems and hotspots may be missed at coarse-grain resolutions, and consequently we used 250 m data resolution to reflect the ecological characteristics of the M-SEA, including more heterogeneous areas, such as mountains, karst, or patchily developed areas.…”

“…Tier 2 classified as R2 hotspot overlap areas, accounting for 32.9% of the total land area, which is comparable with the results of a large number of studies advocating the protection of 30% of the hotspots. 24 The time node for this stage is set to be 2030, which is consistent with the next 10-year plan of biodiversity conservation of ''30 by 30.'' All the hotspots make up tier 3, accounting for 51% of the total land area, close to the Half-Earth conservation approach.…”

“…In recent years the combination of conceptual frameworks and spatial approaches 22,23 have enhanced the ability to develop priorities for biodiversity protection and ecosystem service provision ll regionally and globally, yet most of these have only incorporated biodiversity and carbon dimensions. 24 There is a fundamental lack of integration of scientific frameworks to support the developments of policies to meet the needs of humans and biodiversity. By synthesizing different types of data to map ecosystem service provision and biodiversity while developing methodological standards to enable scientifically meaningful and consistent recommendations for policy development, we can move past theory to policy and management practice.…”

Mapping the irrecoverable carbon in Earth’s ecosystems

“…In one approach, 'Climate Stabilization Areas' or places containing high carbon stocks, are mapped alongside critical areas for conserving biodiversity, together comprising a 'Global Safety Net' covering ~50% of the Earth's surface 49 . An alternate approach optimizes across biodiversity values, carbon stocks and water-provisioning areas to explore proportional overlap across these three dimensions, captured by 30 and 50% of the Earth's terrestrial surface 50 . These studies use total carbon stock (biomass and soil) as a simplified climate prioritization metric.…”