Project summary
Project full
title:
Understanding effeCts
Of land use Changes ON
ecosystems
to halt loss of biodiversity dUe to habitat destruction,
fragmenTation and
degradation
Project acronym: COCONUT
To stop biodiversity declines and
meet future challenges, a better understanding is
needed on how biodiversity is affected by historic and
current land use changes. In the COCONUT project we
will (1) gather existing and new data on both historic
and current species richness and land use (GIS) across
Europe, (2) synthesise these data and perform
meta-analyses to assess the extent of biodiversity loss
and to understand how land use change affects
biodiversity change, 3) use the results to parametrise
predictive models to project future land use and
biodiversity change in response to socio-economic
scenarios, 4) based on these results, and in close
collaboration with key policy makers at the European
level throughout the project, develop decision tools
and policy options for main EU-policy areas for
mitigating biodiversity loss. Relevant policy areas are
agriculture, environment, rural development, transport
and energy.
Historic time lags in extinction
patterns (extinction debts) will be investigated. For
this purpose, detailed data will be collected in five
case study areas on extent of habitat loss,
fragmentation and degradation and impacts on
biodiversity as a result of historic land use changes
dating up to 100 years back. European scale effects of
habitat loss will be explored by data mining of Natura
2000 and other available data bases on biodiversity and
land use. Meta-analyses of existing data on land use
and diversity of plants, invertebrates and birds will
be performed in synthesis workshops to which external
data holders are invited. These results, that are
largely lacking today, will be used to parametrise
biodiversity models that predict risk of species
extinction in land use scenario models. Policy experts
and stakeholders will be involved early on and
throughout the project. Policy oriented workshops
together with a policy advisory board will provide a
framework for continuous dialogue between scientists
and policy makers throughout COCONUT. We aim to develop
support tools and deliver scientific results to
underpin policy options that will minimize and mitigate
biodiversity loss resulting from future land use
changes.
Strong links among the partners to
several EU-projects and national data bases will enable
access to data, tools and information critical for the
development of large scale, general predictions of land
use change effects on biodiversity, and the following
development of policy options for land use management.
Particularly important are the links between COCONUT
and MACIS1. Both projects have strong
synergies with the Integrated Project
ALARM2.
1MACIS, Minimisation of
and Adaptation to Climate change impacts on
biodiversity; STREP SSP5 area 1.5 task 2
2ALARM, Assessing large scale environmental
risks for biodiversity; Integrated Project, see
http://www.alarmproject.net
