Moving from biodiversity offsets to a target‐based approach for ecological compensation

Abstract

Loss of habitats or ecosystems arising from development projects (e.g., infrastructure, resource extraction, urban expansion) are frequently addressed through biodiversity offsetting. As currently implemented, offsetting typically requires an outcome of "no net loss" of biodiversity, but only relative to a baseline trajectory of biodiversity decline. This type of "relative" no net loss entrenches ongoing biodiversity loss, and is misaligned with biodiversity targets that require "absolute" no net loss or "net gain." Here, we review the limitations of biodiversity offsetting, and in response, This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Local conditions and policy design determine whether ecological compensation can achieve No Net Loss goals

“…However, expanding policy scope will increase compensation requirements, which our results suggest are already limited by land availability. A second option is to design policies to achieve biodiversity targets 36,37 , rather than to maintain a counterfactual scenario of decline. This would require more challenging policy decisions about the division of responsibility for achieving conservation outcomes between industry and government, but would improve clarity on how compensation activities contribute to conservation outcomes.…”

Limiting the loss of terrestrial ecosystems to safeguard nature for biodiversity and humanity

“…Harnessing the corporate sector generally (e.g. through commitments to ‘science-based targets’ (Andersen et al 2020)), and the mitigation hierarchy specifically (Simmonds et al 2020) holds substantial promise for resolving tensions between development and ecosystem conservation.…”

“…In large part, this goal’s achievement will necessitate limiting further losses of ecosystems–in other words, retaining the vast majority of what we have now. Some ongoing natural ecosystem depletion is inevitable to meet economic and social development imperatives (Zeng et al 2020), underscoring the vital role of restoration activities to counterbalance losses using protocols such as offsets/ecological compensation (Simmonds et al 2020). However, noting that restoration entails substantial time lags (Crouzeilles et al 2016), is unfeasible or has uncertain outcomes in many instances (Gann et al 2019), and that losses caused by pervasive threats (degradation by invasive species, illegal activities, etc.)…”

Impact mitigation in marine and coastal environments: policy challenges and shortfalls

“…Given the enormous potential for economic development in coastal and marine areas (OECD 2016), impacts that affect marine environments are likely to continue and intensify in the future. In their current form, biodiversity offsets are likely only entrenching continued biodiversity loss (Simmonds et al 2019). Nevertheless, biodiversity offset policies and actions are also likely to continue to expand and be increasingly applied in different marine ecological systems.…”

“…This has already been proposed to some extent in terrestrial environments through the use of target based ecological compensation, where conservation objectives are set to jurisdictional biodiversity targets, and compensation type (e.g. net gain, no net loss) is then based on where a country sits relative to those targets (Maron et al 2020, Simmonds et al 2019 Making development decisions based not only on economic imperatives but also on the long-term environmental and societal objectives could enable offset policies to function more successfully. One approach that could help is to value the ecosystem services provided by intact landscapes, such as the provisioning of food and water (Worm et al 2006).…”