Preserving Biodiversity

There is no single fix. Conservation splits into protecting species where they live and protecting them somewhere else, and both are needed — along with a way of deciding who gets saved first when the money runs out.

Why there is no single solution

As human activities continue to cause a decline in biodiversity, the need for solutions increases. But the problem is complex and there is no one simple answer, so a mixture of different approaches is needed.

The complexity usually comes from conflicts between the needs of the natural world and the needs of humans — and those conflicts are not always easy to resolve. Land that would make a good nature reserve is often also land that people farm, live on or need for work.

In situ conservation

Protected areas

A protected area is a defined geographical space, such as a national park or nature reserve, that is managed and protected for the purposes of conservation.

Restrictions inside a protected area could include:

• Human access is strictly controlled.
• Industrial activities such as agriculture and building are tightly regulated.
• Hunting is limited or completely prohibited.

Rewilding

Rewilding is the restoration of ecosystems to a point at which they can sustain themselves. Such sustainable ecosystems are, by their nature, biodiverse habitats. Rewilding can happen on privately or publicly owned land, and it can be active or passive.

Reclamation

Reclamation is the reclaiming and restoration of areas that have been damaged by human activities — abandoned quarries, or areas where deforestation has taken place. Such projects aim to restore previously existing ecosystems.

Ex situ conservation

Zoos

• Captive breeding programmes increase the number of individuals of a species.
• Breeding can be carried out by artificial insemination, allowing gene flow between individuals living in different zoos. This prevents problems arising from low genetic diversity, and avoids the practical difficulties of captive breeding.
• Captive breeding can lead to individuals being released back into the wild.
• Zoos are an invaluable resource for scientific research: scientists can closely study animal genetics, behaviours and habitat requirements.

Botanic gardens

• Botanic gardens are the plant equivalent of zoos.
• They use cuttings and seeds collected from the wild to establish a population of an endangered species in captivity. Tissue culture and cloning can produce large numbers of plants from a small sample.
• The captive population can later be used for reintroduction into habitats where the species has become rare.
• Research is a major role: investigating reproduction and growth so species can be grown in captivity, and assessing habitat requirements so new habitats can be found if necessary.

Seed banks

• A seed bank conserves plant diversity by drying and storing seeds in a temperature-controlled environment. Cool, dry conditions increase how long seeds remain viable.
• Seeds can only be stored for so long. After a period, stored seeds are grown into plants and fresh seeds are taken from those plants for storage.
• If a species goes extinct, the stored seeds can be used to grow it again.
• Seeds of the same species are usually collected from different sites, to maintain genetic diversity.
• The Svalbard Global Seed Vault in Norway holds seeds from almost 1 million plant species. It sits inside the Arctic Circle, where the environmental conditions are ideal, and many organisations send crop seeds there for safekeeping.

Tissue banks

Tissue banks, also called frozen zoos, store genetic material from animals at very low temperatures. Properly frozen tissue samples are thought to last indefinitely. Ideally, samples come from different individuals of the same species, again to maintain genetic diversity.

Choosing which species to save

So many species need protection that deciding where to put limited resources can seem impossible. The Evolutionarily Distinct and Globally Endangered (EDGE) programme works with the Zoological Society of London (ZSL) to carry out research and highlight the needs of certain species.

A species must be both to be prioritised. Priority EDGE species include the largetooth sawfish, the Chinese giant salamander and the purple frog. The programme highlights their needs to local, government and international conservation organisations, so that such species are not lost before their plight is even recognised.

NOS: these decisions have to be debated

The EDGE criteria are useful, but choosing priority species also involves complex ethical, environmental, political, social, cultural and economic issues.

• A species may not be at a very high global threat level, yet be important for maintaining an ecosystem that supports other, more threatened species.
• A species may be culturally important to a particular nation.
• There may be political reasons why conserving a habitat is very difficult, such as it being located in a warzone.

For this reason, EDGE does not make conservation decisions. It passes important information to stakeholders, allowing a range of people to be involved in the debate.

Worked examples