Identifying the role of conservation biology for solving the environmental crisis

Abstract

Humans are altering their living environment to an extent that could cause environmental collapse. Promoting change into environmental sustainability is therefore urgent. Despite a rapid expansion in conservation biology, appreciation of underlying causes and identification of long-term solutions have largely been lacking. I summarized knowledge regarding the environmental crisis, and argue that the most important contributions toward solutions come from economy, political sciences, and psychology. Roles of conservation biology include providing environmental protection until sustainable solutions have been found, evaluating the effectiveness of implemented solutions, and providing societies with information necessary to align effectively with environmental values. Because of the potential disciplinary discrepancy between finding long-term solutions and short-term protection, we may face critical trade-offs between allocations of resources toward achieving sustainability. Since biological knowledge is required for such trade-offs, an additional role for conservation biologists may be to provide guidance toward finding optimal strategies in such trade-offs.

Impending extinction crisis of the world’s primates: Why primates matter

“…Solutions to the challenge of primate conservation must include reducing human birth rates and population growth, improving health, reducing poverty and gender biases in education, developing sustainable land-use initiatives, and preserving traditional livelihoods (Fig. 6) ( 112 ). Locally, people and governments need to become stakeholders in this effort and perceive that they can benefit from protecting primate populations and their forests while at the same time satisfying their basic needs.…”

“…For instance, promoting the recycling of cell phones, laptops, and other electronic devices could diminish the demand for coltan mining from the Congo Basin in Central Africa, which threatens primates in the region, including gorillas and chimpanzees ( 22 , 152 ). Decreasing the world’s per capita demand for tropical hardwoods, food and nonfood products, minerals, and fossil fuels, among other goods, from primate range regions would help alleviate pressures on primate habitats ( 112 ). …”

Consequences of brown bear viewing tourism: A review

“…Despite a dramatic recent increase the awareness of the global environmental crisis (Dalerum, 2014), public appreciation of environmental issues are still poor in some sectors of society (Robelia and Murphy, 2012). While eco-tourists likely are more aware of environmental issues than a random subset of society (Tapper, 2006), environmental awareness is often not followed by pro-environmental behaviour (Kollmuss and Agyeman, 2002;Matutinovic, 2012).…”

Conservation through Conversation:A Collaborative Corridor Restoration Initiative in the Biligiri Rangaswamy Temple Tiger Reserve, Karnataka, India

“…Moreover, such initiatives bring confidence among local stakeholders regarding conservation. Since nature conservation is often labelled as crisis science, associated with the socio-political dimensions 12 , the interventions made through this line of research will not only improve wildlife corridors, but also maintain the ecological processes, and reduce HWC in the area. At the time of unprecedented habitat destruction, such interventions will contribute not only towards reduced emissions from deforestation and forest degradation, but also enhance carbon stocks in degraded forests 13 .…”