Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Biodiversity Losses and Conservation Responses in The Anthropocene by Johnson Et Al. 2017
Biodiversity Losses and Conservation Responses in The Anthropocene by Johnson Et Al. 2017
with degradation of other values such as quality First, responses to biodiversity decline are being
of coastal and estuarine waters (22). more than offset by rising pressures, related ulti-
“[O]ur knowledge of current mately to increasing human population size and
Global responses
Several international initiatives have attempted
threats suggests that the per capita consumption. Between 1993 and 2009,
the Human Footprint index, a measure of cumu-
to coordinate action to halt or reverse biodiversity rate of extinction could soon lative human impacts on land, increased by 9%,
loss. The most important is the Convention on rise to at least five times mostly because of conversion of habitat for agri-
Biological Diversity (CBD; www.cbd.int), to which culture (Fig. 2) (32), whereas the total area of forest
196 nations are party. In 2002, world leaders
higher than it has been in landscapes unmodified by human use fell by 7.2%
pledged through the CBD “to achieve by 2010 a the recent past.” between 2000 and 2013 (33). The area of ocean
significant reduction of the current rate of bio- fished at high intensity (that is, removing >30%
diversity loss.” The 2010 target was succeeded of available primary productivity) has increased
by the “Aichi Biodiversity targets” for 2011–2020, ical changes over long periods (31) but are since 1950 (34). A recent leveling off in that
a more complex plan to reduce loss of species currently underused in assessments of global trend may represent the limit of productivity of
and natural habitats and safeguard ecosystem change. wild fisheries as well as improvements in fishery
services, while also improving planning, financing, management (34, 35), but cumulative human
knowledge, and benefits from sustainable manage- Causes of failure impacts continue to increase across two-thirds
ment of the natural world. Why have we failed to stem the tide of biodiver- of the world’s oceans, mainly owing to intensify-
The 2010 target was not reached (23), and thus sity loss? We suggest four interrelated reasons. ing effects of climate change (35).
dances, species traits, community over the past 1000 years. (C) Cumulative extinctions of vertebrate species worldwide since 1500 CE: birds (blue),
composition, and ecosystem struc- mammals (red), and other vertebrates (green). Data are from the IUCN Red List (www.iucnredlist.org) and include
ture and function (28). There is also listed species for which a date of last record or estimate of date of extinction is given in the species account. The gray
much potential for improved use of line shows the number of species of mammals that should have gone extinct according to the background extinction
existing ecological records, such as rate estimated from the fossil record—two extinctions per million/species/years (68). (D) Recent trends in percent of
the International Long-Term Ecologi- species threatened in birds, mammals, and amphibians, compared with percent of species threatened in other groups
cal Research Sites network (ILTERS; of organisms that have been systematically assessed by using IUCN Red List criteria: 1, sea cucumbers; 2, Odonata; 3,
www.ilternet.edu). These networks reptiles; 4, seagrasses; 5, Bryophytes; 6, mangroves; 7, pteridophytes; 8, freshwater crabs; 9, sharks and rays; 10,
have broad coverage (Fig. 2) and use freshwater shrimps; 11, freshwater crayfish; 12, reef-building corals; 13, cactuses; 14, freshwater fish; and 15, gymnosperms.
shared protocols to record ecolog- Data sources are provided in the supplementary materials.
ing stabilization of river discharge and reduced of Island Invasive Species Eradications (http://diise.islandconservation.org). Island eradications of in-
risk of inhibition of rainfall, as well as retained vasive predators have been essential in preventing the extinction of species such as the kakapo Strigops
biodiversity (57). habroptilus (B) Recovery of the golden lion tamarin in Brazil. Reintroduction of captive-bred animals and
Efforts to sustain biodiversity in farmed land- restoration of corridors linking forest fragments have resulted in a dramatic increase in the wild pop-
scapes have produced mixed results (58, 59). Con- ulation; shown are population estimates and intervention timeline from Associação Mico-Leão-Dourado.
servation measures on farmland are often costly, (C) China’s National Ecosystem Function Zoning scheme, developed by the Ministry of Environment
and although some succeed, they typically reduce Protection and Chinese Academy of Sciences, to identify areas with key ecosystem functions and where
farm yields and hence are likely to displace pro- development is restricted to protect those functions (source, www.mep.gov.cn/gkml/hbb/bgg/201511/
duction elsewhere (60). This has led instead to t20151126_317777.htm).
Editor's Summary
Article Tools Visit the online version of this article to access the personalization and
article tools:
http://science.sciencemag.org/content/356/6335/270
Science (print ISSN 0036-8075; online ISSN 1095-9203) is published weekly, except the last week
in December, by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, 1200 New York
Avenue NW, Washington, DC 20005. Copyright 2016 by the American Association for the
Advancement of Science; all rights reserved. The title Science is a registered trademark of AAAS.