Applying Global Change Scenarios to assess Changes in Biodiversity

The first workshop 'Managing for biodiversity: Incentives for the protection of nature' focussed on incentives for optimising biodiversity. Here, integrated assessment modelling and scenario analyses were presented as a tool to evaluate different incentives. The scenarios highlighted that rapidly increasing consumption patterns, rapid expansion of rangelands to support changing diets and too slow-moving technological innovations are major attributes of land-use change and biodiversity decline.

It was concluded that scenario studies transparently highlight the complex systemic interactions and feedback between society and the other components of the earth's system. In addition, scenario studies contribute to improving the understanding of changes in biodiversity at global and regional levels of assessment. The second workshop focussed on the use of environmental scenarios to determine the current and future threats to biodiversity. A group of experts on all biomes used the scenarios and estimated changes in biodiversity.

This report presents a summary of results by the expert team. The results suggests that land-use change will be the driver with the largest impact on biodiversity followed by climate change, nitrogen deposition, biotic exchange, and elevated CO₂ concentrations. However, large regional differences emerged. Although local pressures often cause threats to biodiversity, both papers show that scenario analyses with integrated assessment models can help to define future trends. The strength of this approach is that the interactions between different stressors can be determined. Further, the effectiveness of different policy measures can effectively and comprehensively be evaluated with scenario analyses.