A 'Global Safety Net' to reverse biodiversity loss and stabilize Earth’s climate
A landmark study that maps the world's remaining lands supporting biodiversity and climate stabilization, totaling 35.3% of the global terrestrial area beyond 15.1% of protected areas.
Report link: Science Advances (2020)
Approximately half of Earth’s terrestrial surface is considered to be in a natural or seminatural condition. How does this remaining habitat overlap with global conservation priorities and carbon storage requirements? This paper highlights sites of particular importance for biodiversity where additional conservation attention is needed, and other intact lands of high value for carbon storage and other ecosystem services. It also depicts the coincidence and disparities between terrestrial biodiversity and carbon storage priorities. This spatially explicit output, entitled the 'Global Safety Net', is intended to be a dynamic tool to support multilateral, national, and subnational land use planning efforts.
While the parallel crises of biodiversity loss and climate change have generally been approached separately, a key solution for two of the most pressing challenges of our time is the same: conserve enough nature and in the right places. Analyses designed to protect biological diversity have converged on the need to conserve and connect approximately half the Earth. In addition, several studies indicate that above 1.5°C in global average temperature rise, many ecosystems would be unable to adapt and, with increased biodiversity loss, could collapse. Nature-based solutions offer essential means to achieving the global climate objective of staying below 1.5°C. Achieving a future in which people and nature thrive is possible, but more ambitious conservation targets will be required.
The six aggregate layers of the Global Safety Net areas of particular importance for biodiversity and climate stabilization.
This Global Safety Net (GSN) includes 11 spatial layers that, when combined, address expanded biodiversity protection and climate stabilization for the terrestrial realm. Another component of the study applies circuit theory to estimate the extent of wildlife corridors on land that would be required to connect protected areas and intact landscapes as the planet heats up. Besides mapping and assessing remaining natural habitat, the study provides tables by ecoregion and by country required to maximize both biodiversity outcomes and land-based carbon storage. The study also provides statistical estimates of the extent to which GSN areas may overlap with Indigenous territories.
One potential application of the Global Safety Net is to inform the development of “common but differentiated” targets under the new post-2020 framework of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD). It could also help guide land-based mitigation in Nationally Determined Contributions made under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Lead scientist: Eric Dinerstein, Resolve
Contributing authors: Anup Joshi (U Minnesota), Carly Vynne (Resolve), Andy Lee (Resolve), Felix Pharand-Deschenes (Globaia), Manno França (EarthX), Tanya Birch (Google), Karl Burkart (One Earth), Greg Asner (Arizona State U), David Olson (WWF Hong Kong)