Land‐sharing/‐sparing connectivity landscapes for ecosystem services and biodiversity conservation

Abstract

1. The land-sharing versus land-sparing debate recently stagnated, lacking an integrating perspective in agricultural landscapes as well as consideration of ecosystem services. Here, we argue that land-sharing (i.e. wildlife-friendly farming systems) and land-sparing (i.e. separation of high-yielding agriculture and natural habitats) are not mutually exclusive, as both are needed to balance management needs for the multifunctionality of agricultural landscapes.2. Land-sharing promotes ecosystem services in agricultural settings, thereby allowing for environmentally friendly production. Land set aside in protected areas by land-sparing is crucial for conservation of those species that are incompatible with agriculture.3. Importantly, as species move throughout the landscape and exploit different habitats, increased connectivity between environmentally friendly managed and protected areas is needed to (a) promote spillover of ecosystem service providers from land-sharing/-sparing measures to agricultural production and rescue service-providing species from extinction in hostile areas, (b) to facilitate immigration and counteract possible extinctions in spared habitats and (c) to conserve response diversity of species communities for ensuring resilience of ecosystem services in changing environments. 4. In conclusion, the successful management of multifunctional landscapes requires the combination of context-specific land-sharing and land-sparing measures within spatially well-connected landscape mosaics, resulting in land-sharing/sparing connectivity landscapes. K E Y W O R D S agriculture, landscape design, landscape management, land-sharing, land-sparing, multifunctionality, sustainability | 263 People and Nature GRASS et Al.

Transferring biodiversity-ecosystem function research to the management of ‘real-world’ ecosystems

“…A more holistic approach, which accounts for the relative demand for different ecosystem services and how this changes with socio-economic context, is therefore required, e.g., to assess how much land can be returned to a high biodiversity condition while maintaining desired levels of food production and other ecosystem services (Clough et al, 2011;Kremen and Merenlender, 2018;Manning et al, 2018). Such studies should also identify what drives patterns of land use and management and hence biodiversity loss, so that appropriate interventions can be identified (Grass et al, 2019).…”

The erosion of relational values resulting from landscape simplification

“…Foley et al 2011;Clapp 2015)often fueled by misleading scientific or policy framings that pitch nature conservation and food production as incompatible (e.g. Vandermeer and Perfecto 2007;Grass et al 2019). Some of the best known examples of landscape simplification are deforestation for soy production in the Amazon (Fearnside 2001) and Gran Chaco (Gasparri and Grau 2009), oil palm cultivation in Southeast Asia (Wicke et al 2011).…”

Achieving win-win outcomes for pastoral farming and biodiversity conservation in New Zealand

“…Land sparing and land sharing have been proposed as two ways of conceptualising how we might manage biodiversity within agroecosystems, although the consensus seems to be that both are likely to be important, especially because land set aside for biodiversity conservation under the land sparing model is vulnerable to future impacts (Fischer et al 2014). While land sparing and land sharing can be seen as opposite ends of a continuum of approaches to biodiversity management within agroecosystems, the relative importance of either is strongly influenced by both the social-ecological history of the area under consideration and the spatial scale at which landscape elements are being considered (Grass et al 2019).…”