Moving Toward a Global Biodiversity Observation and Measurement System

From Science Magazine:

Biodiversity is a composite term used to embrace the variety of types, forms, spatial arrangements, processes, and interactions of biological systems at all scales and levels of organization, from genes to species and ecosystems, along with the evolutionary history that led to their existence. In part because of this complexity, universally applicable measures of biodiversity have proven elusive. Commonly used measures, such as the number of species present, are strongly scale-dependent and only reveal a change after species have been lost. Indices incorporating several proxy signals are potentially sensitive, but their arbitrariness obscures underlying trends and mechanisms. Integrated measures are both sensitive and achievable, but more research is needed to construct the globally robust relations between population data, genetic variation, and ecosystem condition that they require.

The paper goes on to reiterate the need for national to global-scale biodiversity measurements. This need was highlighted by the adoption of a target to "reduce the rate of loss of biodiversity by 2010" by the 190 countries that are parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).

There is no widely accepted and globally available set of measures to assess biodiversity. Consequently, the community has fallen back on a range of existing data sets gathered for other purposes. Currently, in the CBD process alone, there are ~40 measures reflecting 22 headline indicators in seven focal areas... There is no general shortage of biodiversity data, although it is uneven in its spatial, temporal, and topical coverage. The problem lies in the diversity of the data and the fact that it is physically dispersed and unorganized.

The paper states that the solution to this problem is to organise the information currently available and to create systems whereby data of different kinds, from many sources, can be combined. The authors then go on to propose a new network, the Group on Earth Observations Biodiversity Observation Network (GEOBON) designed to help collect, manage, analyse, and report data relating to the status of the world's biodiversity. The new network would be based on the Global Earth Observation (GEO) platform.

The Group on Earth Observations (GEO) was launched in 2002 in response to the widely identified need for adequate information to support environmental decision-making. GEO is a voluntary partnership of 73 national governments and 46 participating organizations. It provides a framework within which these partners can coordinate their strategies and investments for Earth observation. The GEO members are establishing a Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS) that provides access to data, services, analytical tools, and modeling capabilities through a Web-based GEO Portal.

GEOBON aims to create a global network from multilateral collaborative efforts in the realm of biodiversity by linking and supporting individual efforts within an overarching scientific framework. It is proposed that GEOBON will allow the combination of top-down measures of ecosystem integrity from satellite observations (for example) with bottom-up measures of ecosystem processes, population trends of key organisms and genetic measures of biodiversity from field-based and molecular survey methods. The proposed role of GEOBON will be to guide data collection, standardisation, and information exchange. All participating organizations will retain their mandates and data ownership, but agree to collaborate in making part of their information accessible to others.

References
Scholes RJ, Mace GM, Turner W, Geller GN, Jürgens N, Larigauderie A, Muchoney D, Walther BA, Mooney HA (2008) Toward a Global Biodiversity Observing System. Science 321(5892) 1044-1045.

New Regulation Would Lessen Influence of Fish and Wildlife Experts

The U.S. Endangered Species Act (ESA) has been at the center of some of the fiercest environmental battles in the history of the United States. It has been the law which has held up big dams, helped bring iconic species such as the bald eagle back from the brink, and been used by environmentalists battling loggers over old-growth forests in the Pacific Northwest. For these reasons the ESA is often demonised by those who prefer business as usual to biodiversity preservation.

The Bush Administration, with only a few months left in government, has just proposed a series of controversial rule changes to the ESA that would prevent the review of many new projects by biologists at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS).

The departments of the Interior and Commerce have given two main justifications for the proposed rule changes. The first is to prevent the ESA from being used to regulate carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions. That became a possibility after FWS listed the polar bear as a threatened species. Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne is reported as saying that:

...the changes were needed to ensure that the Endangered Species Act would not be used as a "back door" to regulate the gases blamed for global warming...

The draft rules would bar federal agencies from assessing the emissions from projects that contribute to global warming and its effect on species and habitats.

The second justification given by the departments of the Interior and Commerce for the proposed rule changes is to reduce the number of "informal consultations" around the ESA. The consultations have caused considerable delays on projects in the past according to a 2004 report by the U.S. Government Accountability Office.

Sen. Barbara Boxer, chairwoman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, called the proposed changes illegal.

This proposed regulation is another in a continuing stream of proposals to repeal our landmark environmental laws through the back door," she said. "If this proposed regulation had been in place, it would have undermined our ability to protect the bald eagle, the grizzly bear and the gray whale.

As the rules currently stand, when an action requiring a permit is proposed the permitting agency responsible must consider whether a listed species or its critical habitat might be affected by the proposed action. If the agency decides that a listed species or its critical habitat may be affected, then the agency must informally consult with staff at the relevant service (FWS or NMFS depending on whether it is a terrestrial or marine matter). If the agency or FWS/NMFS biologists decide that the action is likely to cause harm then a formal consultation is required. If the project is thought to be unlikely to cause harm to a listed species or its critical habitat however, then the agency may proceed with issuing whatever permits are required.

Under the proposed new rules, agencies have to consult the services only if indirect or direct effects of their actions are an "essential cause" of and "significant contributor" to the likely harm. Under the new rule, if the agencies determine that their projects are not likely to harm a species, they would not need to seek an expert opinion from the services at all. If the agencies suspect harm to a species, however, they still must formally consult. Officials at the departments of Interior and Commerce argue that agencies are "fully qualified" to decide on their own whether their projects will harm a species or its habitat.

This isn't the first action by the Bush administration to weaken the ESA. An analysis by FWS and NMFS of newly introduced regulations under the National Fire Plan (similar to those proposed under the ESA) was released in January. These regulations allow the U.S. Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management to decide whether to consult about prescribed burning and other fire-related actions. NMFS found that in 10 out of 10 cases:

• The agencies failed to describe spatial and temporal patterns of the action’s direct and indirect environmental effects, including direct and indirect effects of interrelated and interdependent actions;


• The agencies failed to identify Action Areas clearly;


• The agencies failed to identify all threatened and endangered species and any designated critical habitat that may be exposed to the proposed action;


• The agencies failed to compare the distribution of potential effects with the threatened and endangered species and designated critical habitat;


• The agencies failed to identify to establish, using the best scientific and commercial data available, that (a) exposure is improbable or (b) if exposure is likely, responses are insignificant, discountable, or wholly beneficial; and
• The agencies failed to base the determination on best available scientific and commercial information

FWS found other flaws in 25 out of 43 cases. It seems unlikely that removing the oversight provided by FWS and NMFS biologists from more projects that are likely to affect ESA listed species will do anything to improve these statistics. It seems immaterial whether agencies are "fully qualified" to decide on their own whether their projects will harm a species or its habitat if they have no will to protect those species and habitats.

The proposed rule is open for public comment until 15 September. From the FWS:

Submit your comments or materials concerning this proposed rule in one of the following ways:

(1) Through the Federal eRulemaking Portal at www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions on the website for submitting comments.

(2) By U.S. mail or hand-delivery to Public Comment Processing, Attention: 1018-AT50, Division of Policy and Directives Management, US Fish and Wildlife Service, 4401 North Fairfax Drive, Suite 222, Arlington, VA 22203. We will not accept e-mail or faxes.

We will post all comments on www.regulations.gov. This generally means that we will post any personal information you provide us."

More Jonathan Meiburg (Shearwater) Ornithological Geekery

Source: wikimedia.org

Since I posted about Jonathan Meiburg's (not so) secret life as a bird nerd the other day I have been pointed to this series of videos on YouTube:

Jonathan Meiburg of Shearwater gives a tour of the Falkland Islands. As part of a survey team from Falklands Conservation and the Edinburgh Zoo, he searches for Striated Caracaras or, "Johnny Rook".

There are some lovely shots of all kinds of non-birdy wildlife of the Falklands in these videos.

Shearwater's Jonathan Meiburg is a Bird Nerd

 

Source: Scientific American

Here at Small Fish, Big Apple we love Shearwater. We really, really love them. Their new record "Rook" is on high rotate right now at the Small Fish, Big Apple Headquarters. If you don't know Shearwater then you can go here to check out a few songs.

Jonathan Meiburg from Shearwater (formerly of Okkervil River) is the subject of a fascinating interview in Scientific American this week, where he talks about field work he did studying the Striated Caracara in the Falkland Islands for his Masters degree at the University of Texas.

After graduating from Sewanee: The University of the South in Tennessee in 1997, Meiburg spent part of a life-changing year in Tierra del Fuego and the Falkland Islands off the coast of Chile and Argentina getting to know a species of bird related to the falcon called the striated caracara—or Johnny Rook, as British sailors dubbed it, thinking it resembled the crowlike rook. The experience did not just inform his music; it landed him in a graduate program at the University of Texas.

Meiburg speaks reverentially about striated caracaras, which he characterizes as social, curious scavengers. It's a subject that he seems to be more comfortable talking about than his music—partly because he's like a traveler who has seen remote habitats so unbelievable to us town folk that he feels personally charged with the task of sharing the sights he's seen.

Jonathan is a real Bird Nerd, and talks about how he gets to keep his inner nerd fed while also being a super cool touring rock star:

I take my binoculars with me and I enjoy sort of birding for the sake of it. Going to these types of places takes an extreme effort. It's not one that you can really make lightly or certainly not in the context of touring around with a rock band.

On this last tour though, we had a day off in Washington, D.C., and I went to the Smithsonian. I thought I'd just go the natural history museum and walk around. But when I walked in, I suddenly remembered that this guy, Storrs Olson, if he wasn't retired would still be there. He's like "Mr. Subfossil Bird Bones" (and a lot of other subfossil animals, but especially birds—and especially island birds). He had published a paper that I'd used in my thesis describing an extinct species of caracara from a tar seep in Cuba. He mentioned, in this one little sentence in the paper, bones from this very large, possibly flightless caracara from Jamaica, but doesn't provide any more description than that. I thought, "That's really interesting. He's talking about a flightless caracara, like a bird of prey that can't fly, but lived in Jamaica."

So, I went to the security desk and got [them] call to his office. He answered—and you have your 10 seconds—and I said something or the other about caracaras. And he said, "Okay, I'll be right down." So, he came down and he took me back to his office and we talked for about an hour and a half about island birds and extinct giant raptors. And he showed me the bones of this bird. His full description is in press right now. It's going to come out in the Journal of Raptor Research. So, I got to see the bones of this extinct, probably flightless caracara from Jamaica. It's just an unbelievable thrill to see things like that. I could have walked right by his office and never known that experience was potentially waiting for me.

Carbon Trading and Biodiversity Credits

Conservation biology began life as a crisis discipline, its central tenet to understand and help reverse losses of biodiversity and habitat (Armsworth et al 2007) . Those losses of biodiversity and habitat continue today, implying that conservation biology is not achieving its central aim. New tools for protecting habitat and biodiversity are urgently required if these losses are to be halted.

Carbon trading is an administrative approach used to control carbon emissions by providing economic incentives for achieving reductions in the emissions of carbon. Carbon trading was introduced as part of the Kyoto Protocol's goal to reduce industrial nations' greenhouse gas emissions to below 1990 levels by 2012. The idea was that countries whose emissions fall under the emissions cap - the permitted level of CO2 equivalent emissions per year - could then sell those carbon credits to countries who are not able to meet their own caps.

An article in the June 2008 issue of Conservation Biology - Using Carbon Investment to Grow the Biodiversity Bank (Bekesy and Wintle 2008) - contains a novel and exciting proposal for halting biodiversity losses through a capped carbon trading regime. The authors propose simply that:

...investors should be allowed to reap the dual benefits of carbon and biodiversity credits from one parcel of land and those credits could later be traded on the relevant markets.

This is proposed as a response to the current approaches to carbon emissions offsetting which rely largely on investment in monoculture plantations. The authors go on to say that:

[the proposed scheme is] ...more robust to uncertainty about carbon sequestration and is guaranteed to have broad environmental benefits, including restoration of degraded natural systems and endangered species habitats. The proposed scheme provides a mechanism for investing in the world's most threatened ecosystems that makes carbon, biodiversity, and financial sense.

This is topical at the moment due to a convergence of a number of powerful factors: In 2007 Rupert Murdoch declared that News Corporation would be carbon neutral across all of its businesses by 2010, committing to reducing and offsetting its greenhouse gas emissions. This follows commitments by the World Bank Group, Formula One, and VirginBlue, among other large economic interests. On 30 April 2007 Australia's Commonwealth, State and Territory Governments commissioned an independent study by Professor Ross Garnaut into the impacts of climate change on the Australian economy. The Garnaut Review's Final Report is due on 30 September 2008, with a Draft Report due by 30 June 2008. The review will recommend medium to long-term policies and policy frameworks to improve the prospects for sustainable prosperity. The New Zealand Government currently has a bill for emissions trading schemes before a select committee. Various reports by a range of groups support the scheme but differ in opinion as to how it should be implemented, and the proposed bill appears to currently be stalled in parliament without sufficient votes to pass in it's current form.

The Garnaut Climate Change Review's approach to climate change mitigation was initially set out in the Interim Report released in February 2008. That report stated that:

Australia must now put in place effective policies to achieve major reductions in emissions. The emissions trading scheme (ETS) is the centre-piece of a domestic mitigation strategy.

That proposed ETS was described in a discussion paper released in March 2008. Public forums on the Draft Report will be held in a number of capital cities across Australia from 7 to 11 July 2008. These public forums appear to be an ideal place for the powerful idea of biodiversity credits tied to carbon trading to be raised and debated in public.

References:

Armsworth PR, Chan KMA, Daily GC, Ehrlich PR, Kremen C, Ricketts TH, Sanjayan MA (2007) Ecosystem-Service Science and the Way Forward for Conservation Conservation Biology 21 (6), 1383-1384.

Bekesy and Wintle (2008) Using Carbon Investment to Grow the Biodiversity Bank Conservation Biology 22 (3), 510-513