Protection of regional biodiversity requires that priority for protection of individual areas be based on both the contribution the area can make to representing overall biodiversity and the degree to which the area, in the absence of action, is vulnerable to loss of its biodiversity. Attempts to apply these criteria together largely have been ad hoc. A solution to this problem is presented for environmental surrogate data, based on ‘environmental diversity’ (ED). ED uses a standard ecological continuum model to link environmental pattern to species-level biodiversity, so that a set of areas can be characterized by its relative expected biodiversity. This allows explicit incorporation of estimates of area-vulnerability, interpreted as the relative probability that any member species will not persist, into biodiversity assessments. The contribution of a given area to regional expected biodiversity is influenced not only by its own vulnerability value, but also by the vulnerability of other areas. Increasing the degree of protection of any area (reducing its vulnerability) will increase expected biodiversity: however, expected regional biodiversity sometimes may be maximized when limited resources for protection are directed to an area with lower vulnerability rather than to one with higher vulnerability.
The allocation of land uses in a region need not be viewed as an all-or-nothing assignment of protection. The effect of a particular management regime on the biodiversity of a given area can be equated with some consequent degree of vulnerability; viewed positively, a management regime that offers some degree of biodiversity protection can make a measurable contribution to the protection of the biodiversity of a region.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Bedward, M., Pressey, R.L. and Keith, D. (1992) A new approach for selecting fully representative reserve networks: addressing efficiency, reserve design and land suitability with an iterative analysis. Biol. Conserv. 62, 115–25.
Dinerstein, E. and Wikramanayake, E.D. (1993) Beyond ‘hotspots’: how to prioritise investments to conserve biodiversity in the Indo-pacific region. Conserv. Biol. 7, 53–65.
Faith, D.P. (1992) Conservation evaluation and phylogenetic diversity. Biol. Conserv. 61, 1–10.
Faith, D.P. (1994) Phylogenetic pattern and the quantification of organismal biodiversity. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. Lond. B 345, 45–58.
Faith, D.P. and Walker, P.A. (1993) DIVERSITY: a software package for sampling phylogenetic and environmental diversity. Reference and user's guide. v. 1.0. CSIRO Division of Wildlife and Ecology. Canberra.
Faith, D.P. (1995) Biodiversity and Regional Sustainability Analysis. CSIRO: Canberra.
Faith, D.P. and Walker, P.A. (1994) DIVERSITY: a software package for sampling phylogenetic and environmental diversity. Reference and user's guide. v. 2.1. CSIRO Division of Wildlife and Ecology. Canberra.
Faith, D.P. and Walker, P.A. (1996a) Environmental diversity: how to make best-possible use of surrogate data for assessing the relative biodiversity of sets of areas. Biodiv. Conserv. 5, 399–415.
Faith, D.P. and Walker, P.A. (1996b) Effective trade-offs between biodiversity and cost in the selection of protected areas. Integrating conservation and development: Biodiv. Conserv. 5, 431–46.
Fjeldså, J. (1994) Geographical patterns for relict and young species of birds in Africa and South America and implications for conservation priorities. Biodiv. Conserv. 3, 207–26.
Gauch, H.G. (1982) Multivariate Analysis in Community Ecology. Cambridge University Press.
Keddy, C.J. and Sharp, M.J. (1994) A protocol to identify and prioritise significant coastal plain plant assemblages for protection. Biol. Conserv. 68, 269–74.
Margules, C.M. (1986) Conservation evaluation in practice. In Wildlife Conservation Evaluation (M.B. Usher, ed.) pp. 297–314. London: Chapman and Hall.
Margules, C.R. and Nicholls, A.O. (1987) Assessing the conservation value of remnant habitat patches on the Western Eyre Peninsula, South Australia. In Nature Conservation: the Role of Remnants of Native Vegetation (D.A. Saunders, G.W. Arnold, A.A. Burbidge and A.J. Hopkins, eds) pp. 89–102. Surrey Beatty and Sons.
Margules, C.R., Cresswell, I.D. and Nicholls, A.O. (1994) A scientific basis for establishing networks of protected areas. In Systematics and Conservation Evaluation (P.L. Forey, C.J. Humphries and R.I., Vane-Wright, eds) pp. 327–50. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Morton, S.R., Stafford-Smith, D.M., Friedel, M.H., Griffin, G.F. and Pickup, G. (1995) The stewardship of arid Australia: ecology and landscape management. J. Env. Man.
Myers, N. (1990) The biodiversity challenge: expanded hotspots analysis. The Environmentalist 10, 243–56.
Nicholls, A.O. and Margules, C.R. (1993) An upgraded reserve selection algorithm. Biol. Conserv. 64, 165–9.
Noss, R.F. (1987) From plant communities to landscapes in conservation inventories: a look at the nature conservancy (USA). Biol. Conserv. 41, 11–37.
Pressey, R.L., Humphries, C.J., Margules, C.R., Vane-Wright, R.I. and Williams, P.H. (1993) Beyond opportunism: key principles for systematic reserve selection. Trends Ecol. Evol. 8, 124–8.
Pressey, R.L. and Logan, V.S. (1994) Level of geographical subdivision and its effects on assessments of reserve coverage: a review of regional studies. Conserv. Biol. 8, 1037–46.
Weitzman, M.L. (1992) On diversity. Q.J. Econ. 58, 157–83.
Witting, L. and Loeschcke, V. (1993) Biodiversity conservation: reserve optimisation or loss minimisation? Trends Ecol. Evol. 8, 417.
Witting, L. and Loeschcke, V. (1995) The optimisation of biodiversity conservation, Biol. Conserv. 71, 205–7.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Faith, D.P., Walker, P.A. Integrating conservation and development: incorporating vulnerability into biodiversity-assessment of areas. Biodivers Conserv 5, 417–429 (1996). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00056388
Received:
Accepted:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00056388