Global congruence of carbon storage and biodiversity in terrestrial ecosystems
Article first published online: 17 DEC 2009
©2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.
Volume 3, Issue 2, pages 98–105, April 2010
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How to Cite
Strassburg, B. B.N., Kelly, A., Balmford, A., Davies, R. G., Gibbs, H. K., Lovett, A., Miles, L., Orme, C. D. L., Price, J., Turner, R. K. and Rodrigues, A. S.L. (2010), Global congruence of carbon storage and biodiversity in terrestrial ecosystems. Conservation Letters, 3: 98–105. doi: 10.1111/j.1755-263X.2009.00092.x
- Issue published online: 20 APR 2010
- Article first published online: 17 DEC 2009
- Received: 9 September 2009; accepted 2 November 2009.
- climate change;
- biological conservation;
- carbon stocks;
- ecosystem services
Deforestation is a main driver of climate change and biodiversity loss. An incentive mechanism to reduce emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) is being negotiated under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. Here we use the best available global data sets on terrestrial biodiversity and carbon storage to map and investigate potential synergies between carbon and biodiversity-oriented conservation. A strong association (rS= 0.82) between carbon stocks and species richness suggests that such synergies would be high, but unevenly distributed. Many areas of high value for biodiversity could be protected by carbon-based conservation, while others could benefit from complementary funding arising from their carbon content. Some high-biodiversity regions, however, would not benefit from carbon-focused conservation, and could become under increased pressure if REDD is implemented. Our results suggest that additional gains for biodiversity conservation are possible, without compromising the effectiveness for climate change mitigation, if REDD takes biodiversity distribution into account.