The dilemma of alternative land uses in conservation prioritization

Balancing alternative land uses in conservation prioritization

Atte Moilanen,Barbara J. Anderson,Felix Eigenbrod,Andreas Heinemeyer, David B. Roy, Simon Gillings, Paul R. Armsworth, Kevin J. Gaston, and Chris D. Thomas.

 Ecological applications, Volume 21, Issue 5 (July 2011)

As the population burgeons there is increasing pressure on ecosystems to provide various often-conflicting services.

Success of various conservation prioritizations will be much more effective if we assess the needs of competing land uses at the planning stage itself.

In this paper the researchers develop such methods and illustrate them with data about competing land uses in Great Britain, with the aim of developing conservation priority ranking that balances between needs of biodiversity conservation, carbon storage, agricultural value, and urban development potential.

The researchers say, “While both carbon stocks and biodiversity are desirable features from the point of view of conservation, they compete with the needs of agriculture and urban development.”

In their application, the researchers were able to successfully balance the spatial allocation of alternative land uses. The conflicts between various demands were much smaller than had they been developed separately. The researchers say proposed methods and software, Zonation, are applicable to structurally similar prioritization problems globally.