The EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030: Opportunities and challenges on the path towards biodiversity recovery

Hermoso, Virgilio; Carvalho, Sílvia B.; Giakoumi, Sylvaine; Goldsborough, David; Katsanevakis, Stelios; Leontiou, Stalo; Markantonatou, Vasiliki; Rumes, B.; Vogiatzakis, Ioannis Ν.; Yates, Katherine L.

doi:10.1016/j.envsci.2021.10.028

Cited by 96 publications

(47 citation statements)

References 80 publications

(93 reference statements)

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“…Worldwide, many species and ecosystems are separately managed between neighboring countries via domestic legal orders, despite the international agreements that are in place, precluding effective international collaboration among the stakeholders (Trouwborst et al, 2017). At the EU level, despite the obligation of EU Member states to implement the environmental directives and the establishment of Natura 2000 network to protect species and habitats of community interest, the conservation measures are hindered as the appropriate management of the sites is still not implemented (Kati et al, 2015;Hermoso et al, 2022). Conservation scientists identified that (a) conservation efforts have been inadequately coordinated within and across the EU Member States, (b) mainstreaming biodiversity conservation in sectoral policy has been suboptimal, and (c) adequate funding and effective enforcement of conservation management have not been in in place (Hermoso et al, 2022).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…At the EU level, despite the obligation of EU Member states to implement the environmental directives and the establishment of Natura 2000 network to protect species and habitats of community interest, the conservation measures are hindered as the appropriate management of the sites is still not implemented (Kati et al, 2015;Hermoso et al, 2022). Conservation scientists identified that (a) conservation efforts have been inadequately coordinated within and across the EU Member States, (b) mainstreaming biodiversity conservation in sectoral policy has been suboptimal, and (c) adequate funding and effective enforcement of conservation management have not been in in place (Hermoso et al, 2022). An earlier study reported the lack of political will toward effective implementation, the negative attitude of local stakeholders, the lack of background knowledge of local stakeholders, and the understaffing of Natura 2000 management authorities as main weaknesses (Kati et al, 2015).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Legal Framework for Pontocaspian Biodiversity Conservation in the Danube Delta (Romania and Ukraine)

Gogaladze

Biesmeijer

Son

et al. 2022

Front. Conserv. Sci.

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The declining biodiversity has upsetting consequences for social and economic development and represents a major concern for humanity. Legal and political framework plays an important role in biodiversity conservation planning, implementation, and coordination of actions. Legal provisions are complex and operate on different levels of governance (from supranational to national), which means that the status of single species or populations may be governed by a set of interacting or even conflicting regulations, with increasing complexity for species that occur across national borders. Romania (EU member state) and Ukraine (non-EU member state) exemplify neighboring countries with different governance systems, which share the same endemic aquatic communities inhabiting the transitional zones between freshwater and marine ecosystems, known regionally as Pontocaspian (PC) biota. These communities include flagship species such as sturgeons and less-known crustaceans and mollusks and are severely threatened as a result of human activities. We assessed the legal basis for the protection of PC biota in the Danube Delta and the effectiveness of current conservation approaches based on a review of legal documents and literature, expert opinion, and practitioner reflections regarding PC biodiversity conservation. We found that PC invertebrate species are not adequately addressed in the current legal documents and that the surrogate approach (where protection of umbrella species results in protection of background species) does not work as there is little overlap between the habitats of sturgeons and PC invertebrate communities. Furthermore, the habitat definitions currently used in legal documents lack the level of detail needed to protect PC habitats that are characterized by specific salinity (brackish) conditions. We finish by sketching out recommendations toward improved legal and political frameworks for effective and efficient conservation of PC invertebrate biota.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Legal Framework for Pontocaspian Biodiversity Conservation in the Danube Delta (Romania and Ukraine)

Gogaladze

Biesmeijer

Son

et al. 2022

Front. Conserv. Sci.

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“…Conservation goals for each habitat type include maintaining stable or increasing distribution, retention of ecosystem structure and functions, and favorable conservation status of the ecosystem's component species (Habitats Directive Article 1(e)). The EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030 calls for new legislation, as mentioned above, containing quantitative targets for ecosystem conservation and restoration in line with the GBF, which would be legally binding on the Member States (European Commission 2020a; Hermoso et al, 2022). If enacted and fully implemented, this new law would directly implement the ecosystem goal of the GBF throughout the EU.…”

Section: Conservation Of Ecosystemsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Clearly, the current implementation of the Directives is not sufficient to meet the GBF targets (Hermoso et al, 2022). At the same time, legal action by the EU to enforce compliance by the Member States has sharply decreased and depends almost entirely on NGO lawsuits (Hofmann, 2019).…”

Section: Speciesmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Mainstreaming the Ambition, Coherence, and Comprehensiveness of the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework Into Conservation Policy

Carroll

Rohlf²,

Epstein

2022

Front. Conserv. Sci.

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Parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity are finalizing a new Global Biodiversity Framework (GBF) to more effectively guide efforts by the world’s nations to address global loss of biodiversity and ecosystem services. Each party is required to mainstream the new framework and its component targets into national conservation strategies. To date, such strategies have been criticized as largely aspirational and lacking clear linkages to national policy mechanisms, which has contributed to the world’s general failure to meet the Convention’s previous targets. We use the United States and European Union as examples to compare and contrast opportunities and barriers for mainstreaming the GBF more effectively into policy. The European Union and United States have unique relationships to the Convention, the former being the only supranational party and the latter, having signed but never ratified the treaty, adopting Convention targets on an ad hoc basis. The contrasting conservation policy frameworks of these two polities illustrate several conceptual issues central to biodiversity conservation and demonstrate how insights from the GBF can strengthen biodiversity policy even in atypical contexts. We focus on three characteristics of the GBF which are essential if policy is to effectively motivate and guide efforts to halt and reverse biodiversity loss: comprehensiveness, coherence, and ambition. Statutes in both the United States and European Union provide a strong foundation for mainstreaming the GBF’s comprehensiveness, coherence, and ambition, but policy development and implementation falls short. We identify six common themes among the reforms needed to successfully achieve targets for reversing biodiversity loss: broadening conservation focus to all levels of biodiversity, better coordinating conservation strategies that protect sites and landscapes with those focused on biodiversity elements (e.g., species), coordinating biodiversity conservation with efforts to safeguard ecosystem services including ecosystem-based climate mitigation and adaptation, more coherent scaling of targets from global to local extents, adoption of a more ambitious vision for recovery of biodiversity, and development of effective tracking and accountability mechanisms.

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Supporting the planning and management of biodiversity through the development of a geospatial decision support system

Mileti,

Russo,

Fraissinet

et al. 2024

Land Degrad Dev

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Today, the issue of biodiversity conservation is, more than ever before, one of primary importance since it has become common knowledge that biodiversity provides many services that are relevant to the sustaining of ecological integrity and, so, for the benefit of humanity. Within this framework, rural areas are particularly exposed to degradation threats and, therefore, biodiversity loss due to their lying between and interlinking with urban and natural areas. The European Commission underlines the relevance of this conservation in its Biodiversity Strategy for 2030, which identifies a series of needs for conserving biodiversity in Europe, among which is the need for more operational tools to support biodiversity management. This paper aims to demonstrate that a geoSpatial decision support system (S‐DSS), developed through focused interdisciplinary research and implemented over a Geospatial Cyberinfrastructure, might provide a powerful web‐based operational tool to encourage both the engagement of a large range of end‐users and stakeholders and the better implementation of the Habitats Directive as indicated by the Biodiversity Strategy for 2030. The platform supports data visualization and on‐the‐fly computer applications for modeling, all via a web browser. The S‐DSS tool brings together knowledge of soil and environmental sciences, biodiversity and information technology. The S‐DSS tool is demonstrated through three use cases in the Campania region (Southern Italy) from different users' perspectives. The connection of data and model aims to provide information that will improve knowledge and awareness of biodiversity. In just a few clicks, the production of maps, results and statistics provides an overview of the biodiversity over a personalized area drawn by the user. The approach is highly transferable to other areas, from other administrative regions to the whole European territory, because it is based on general algorithms that are easily applied elsewhere, providing there is the necessary data availability.

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The EU Biodiversity Strategy for 2030: Opportunities and challenges on the path towards biodiversity recovery

Cited by 96 publications

References 80 publications

Legal Framework for Pontocaspian Biodiversity Conservation in the Danube Delta (Romania and Ukraine)

Legal Framework for Pontocaspian Biodiversity Conservation in the Danube Delta (Romania and Ukraine)

Mainstreaming the Ambition, Coherence, and Comprehensiveness of the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework Into Conservation Policy

Supporting the planning and management of biodiversity through the development of a geospatial decision support system

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