A Singular Concept of Biodiversity Remains the Best Way to Address the Plural Values of Nature in Conservation Planning

Abstract

The term “biodiversity” generally refers to living variation. Biodiversity has recognized anthropocentric values of insurance and investment. Values of “nature” include those of biodiversity and also many other aspects reflecting the scope of human-nature relationships. Systematic conservation planning methods can integrate this range of local to global values. Early case studies in Australia and Papua New Guinea show the potential for such approaches. Recently, there have been calls for a recasting of the concept of biodiversity to capture plurality of values. However, balance among sometimes conflicting values of nature is best-served by a singular biodiversity concept and definition focused on variety, because this enables effective integration with other values of nature. Attempts at pluralistic recastings of biodiversity in fact may promote neglect of global biodiversity values. Further, an extended analysis of the Papua New Guinea case study shows that it cannot be argued that focusing on localized values of nature for conservation will effectively address regional/global scale conservation needs.

Global hotspots of plant phylogenetic diversity

“…It captures both the evolutionary past and possible future evolutionary potential in a region, as well as the ‘option value’ of biodiversity for future human uses. However, it is no panacea for conservation prioritisation, which requires a full grasp of trade‐offs between different diversity measures such as basic species counts, phylogenetic diversity metrics, functional and trait diversity and anthropogenic factors, including rapid changes in land use and the ubiquitous effects of climate change and plant distribution and diversity (Pollock et al ., 2017; Faith, 2021). We do not intend to judge the relative importance of these factors or suggest that PD is the most relevant.…”

“…By accounting for the total amount of phylogenetic history represented by a set of taxa, PD (Faith, 1992) broadly captures diversity in form and function (Owen et al ., 2019), and is connected to the resilience of key ecosystem functions (Mazzochini et al ., 2019) and services (Forest et al ., 2007; Molina‐Venegas et al ., 2021). Phylogenetic diversity is also a widely accepted indicator of the ‘option value’ of biodiversity for future uses and benefits to people (Faith, 2021). It has been established explicitly as a guiding measure for conservation efforts, that is to identify areas that maximise the amount of protected PD and hence feature diversity (Faith, 1992; Véron et al ., 2019).…”