Browsing by Subject "biodiversity"
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Item Open Access Assessing the Effects of Management Activities on Biodiversity and Carbon Storage on Public and Private Lands and Waters in the United States(2023-04-13) Warnell, Katie; Mason, Sara; Karasik, Rachel; Olander, Lydia; Posner, Stephen; Alonso-Rodríguez, Aura; Aristizábal, Natalia; Bloomfield, Laura; Estifanos, Tafesse; Gourevitch, Jesse; Littlefield, Caitlin; Mazurowski, Jason; Menice, Katarina; Moore, Maya; Nicholson, Charlie; Sands, Bryony; Spencer, Leslie; Treuer, Tim; Ricketts, Taylor; Hartley, ChrisNatural and working lands (NWLs) provide many benefits to people, including storing greenhouse gases (GHGs), supporting biodiversity, and generating other ecosystem services. Management of NWLs can influence their condition and function and therefore the benefits they provide. This project surveys the synthesis literature to assess how different management actions on various types of NWLs affect biodiversity and GHG outcomes. This information can help to determine how to best manage these lands to contribute to both biodiversity and climate solutions in the United States. These results are a starting point to assess how different forms of management on various types of NWLs contribute to or detract from biodiversity and GHG outcomes. Though this study’s scope was limited to an exploration of biodiversity and GHG benefits provided by NWLs, this process could be adapted to examine the effects of management on other important ecosystem services, as well as how management affects equitable distribution of those services. Additional quantitative synthesis is also needed to compare the magnitude of different management activities’ impacts on biodiversity and carbon and to better understand how the intensity of certain activities influences these outcomes. This report is a collaboration between the Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment & Sustainability and the Gund Institute for Environment at the University of Vermont. This research was supported by the US Department of Agriculture, Office of Environmental Markets, under a cooperative agreement. The findings and conclusions in this report are those of the authors and should not be construed to represent any official USDA or US Government determination or policy. For related work, please see Tracking the Benefits of Natural & Working Lands in the United States: Dataset Evaluation and Readiness Assessment.Item Open Access Deforestation risks posed by oil palm expansion in the Peruvian Amazon(Environmental Research Letters, 2018-11-01) Vijay, V; Reid, CD; Finer, M; Jenkins, CN; Pimm, SLFurther expansion of agriculture in the tropics is likely to accelerate the loss of biodiversity. One crop of concern to conservation is African oil palm (Elaeis guineensis). We examined recent deforestation associated with oil palm in the Peruvian Amazon within the context of the region's other crops. We found more area under oil palm cultivation (845 km2) than did previous studies. While this comprises less than 4% of the cropland in the region, it accounted for 11% of the deforestation from agricultural expansion from 2007-2013. Patches of oil palm agriculture were larger and more spatially clustered than for other crops, potentially increasing their impact on local habitat fragmentation. Modeling deforestation risk for oil palm expansion using climatic and edaphic factors showed that sites at lower elevations, with higher precipitation, and lower slopes than those typically used for intensive agriculture are at long-term risk of deforestation from oil palm agriculture. Within areas at long-term risks, based on CART models, areas near urban centers, roads, and previously deforested areas are at greatest short-term risk of deforestation. Existing protected areas and officially recognized indigenous territories cover large areas at long-term risk of deforestation for oil palm (>40%). Less than 7% of these areas are under strict (IUCN I-IV) protection. Based on these findings, we suggest targeted monitoring for oil palm deforestation as well as strengthening and expanding protected areas to conserve specific habitats.Item Open Access Distinct Community-Wide Responses to Forecasted Climate Change in Afrotropical Forests(Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution, 2022-01-18) Núñez, CL; Poulsen, JR; White, LJT; Medjibe, V; Clark, JSMore refined knowledge of how tropical forests respond to changes in the abiotic environment is necessary to mitigate climate change, maintain biodiversity, and preserve ecosystem services. To evaluate the unique response of diverse Afrotropical forest communities to disturbances in the abiotic environment, we employ country-wide tree species inventories, remotely sensed climate data, and future climate predictions collected from 104 1-ha plots in the central African country of Gabon. We predict a 3–8% decrease in Afrotropical forest species richness by the end of the century, in contrast to the 30–50% loss of plant diversity predicted to occur with equivalent warming in the Neotropics. This work reveals that forecasts of community species composition are not generalizable across regions, and more representative studies are needed in understudied diverse biomes. This study serves as an important counterpoint to work done in the Neotropics by providing contrasting predictions for Afrotropical forests with substantially different ecological, evolutionary, and anthropogenic histories.