Guy Pe'er’s research while affiliated with German Centre for Integrative Biodiversity Research (iDiv) Halle-Jena-Leipzig and other places

Perennial woody crops, which are crucial to our diets and global economies, have the potential to play a major role in achieving multiple UN Sustainable Development Goals pertaining to biodiversity conservation, socio-economic development and climate change mitigation. However, this potential is hindered by insufficient scientific and policy attention on perennial woody crops, and by the intensification of perennial crop cultivation in the form of monocropping with high external inputs. In this Perspective, we highlight the potential of properly managed and incentivized perennial woody crops to support holistic sustainable development and urge scientists and policymakers to develop an effective agenda to better harness their benefits.

To achieve the goals of the 2030 Global Biodiversity Framework, the European Biodiversity Strategy, and the EU Green Deal, biodiversity monitoring is critical. Monitoring efforts in Europe, however, suffer from gaps and biases in taxonomy, spatial coverage, and temporal resolution, resulting in fragmented and disconnected data. To assess user and policy needs in biodiversity monitoring, we employed a four‐step user‐centered stakeholder engagement process with over 300 stakeholders including a public stakeholder workshop, online survey, interviews, and a meeting with experts from 18 EU member states, the European Commission, and the European Environment Agency. The stakeholders identified policy needs, current challenges, and potential solutions. Based on the policy and stakeholder assessment, we recommend establishing a European Biodiversity Observation Coordinating Centre to optimize existing observation efforts, harmonize data, and enhance our ability to predict and respond to key challenges related to biodiversity loss in Europe.

Grazing of both domestic and wild large herbivores can contribute to multiple ecosystem services. However, grazing systems strongly differ in the intensity of management and outcomes, and we define sustainable grazing as grazing which benefits multiple environmental ecosystem services. Previous studies have found that, in general, grazing systems with relatively low densities of animals, and with minimal and only targeted applications of deworming and other medicinal treatments, are most sustainable. However, for people engaged in such grazing management, a key question is what are their challenges and motivation. We conducted interviews with 74 land-users, who are engaged in sustainable grazing management, in eight case-study areas in Europe. Employing the capability, opportunity and motivation-behaviour model (COM-B), we identified key motivation factors driving sustainable grazing management and the challenges which these land-users face. We found that capability and opportunity linked to land abandonment and rural exodus impact upon land-users' management, especially in parts of South and Eastern Europe. Furthermore, challenges linked to the environment were particularly important in remote areas. In addition, we found economic aspects to be important in driving land-users' behaviour, especially fiscal measures of the Common Agricultural Policy. Moreover, our results indicate that engagement in sustainable grazing management is often intrinsically motivated by the interest in nature conservation, intergenerational continuity and cohesion in the rural community. Based on these results, using the Behaviour Change Wheel, we identify key interventions that could facilitate and encourage the capabilities and opportunities to conduct sustainable grazing management. These include incentivising extensification using subsidies, developing direct market possibilities and removing administrative hurdles for practises related to very extensive and semi-wild grazing.

To implement the goals of the 2030 Global Biodiversity Framework, the European Biodiversity Strategy and the EU Green Deal, biodiversity monitoring is a pivotal instrument to achieve accountability and progress in conservation. Monitoring efforts in Europe, however, suffer from gaps and biases in taxonomy, spatial coverage, and temporal resolution, resulting in fragmented and disconnected data which does not provide sufficient evidence for policy making. To assess user and policy needs in biodiversity monitoring, we employed with EuropaBON a four-step user-centred stakeholder engagement process, including an international public stakeholder workshop, a standardised online survey, semi-structured interviews, and an expert meeting with representatives of EU member states, the European Commission and the European Environment Agency. The resulting insights into national and European biodiversity monitoring schemes identify policy needs, current challenges and potential solutions. Based on this in-depth policy and science stakeholder assessment, we recommend the establishment of a European Biodiversity Observation Network through a permanent Biodiversity Monitoring and Coordinating Centre to optimise existing observation efforts, harmonise data, and enhance our ability to predict and respond to key challenges related to biodiversity loss in a changing climate in Europe.

Increasing the policy impact and effectiveness of biodiversity monitoring in Europe: current state and gaps.

The viability of populations can be quantified with several measures, such as the probability of extinction, the mean time to extinction, or the population size. While conservation management decisions can be based on these measures, it has not yet been explored systematically if different viability measures rank species and scenarios similarly and if one viability measure can be converted into another to compare studies. To address this challenge, we conducted a quantitative comparison of eight viability measures based on the simulated population dynamics of more than 4500 virtual species. We compared (a) the ranking of scenarios based on different viability measures, (b) assessed direct correlations between the measures, and (c) explored if parameters in the simulation models can alter the relationship between pairs of viability measures. We found that viability measures ranked species similarly. Despite this, direct correlations between the different measures were often weak and could not be generalized. This can be explained by the loss of information due to the aggregation of raw data into a single number, the effect of model parameters on the relationship between viability measures, and because distributions, such as the probability of extinction over time, cannot be ranked objectively. Similar scenario rankings by different viability measures show that the choice of the viability metric does in many cases not alter which population is regarded more viable or which management option is the best. However, the more two scenarios or populations differ, the more likely it becomes that different measures produce different rankings. We thus recommend that PVA studies publish raw simulation data, which not only describes all risks and opportunities to the reader but also facilitates meta-analyses of PVA studies.

The European Union's Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) has not halted farmland biodiversity loss. The CAP post‐2023 has a new ‘‘Green Architecture,’’ including the new ‘‘Eco‐scheme’’ instrument. How can this new Green Architecture help tackle the biodiversity crisis? Through 13 workshops and an online survey, over 300 experts from 23 European Member States addressed this question. From experts’ contributions, key principles for success include preserving and restoring (semi)natural elements and extensive grasslands; improving spatial planning and landscape‐scale implementation, including through collective actions; implementing result‐based approaches; and improved knowledge exchange. To maximize the effectiveness of Eco‐scheme for biodiversity, experts highlighted the need to prioritize evidence‐based actions, allocate a sufficient budget for biodiversity, and incentivize management improvements through higher payment levels. Additionally, stronger coherence is needed among CAP instruments. For effective CAP implementation, the European Commission and the Member States should expand investments in biodiversity monitoring, knowledge transfer, and capacity‐building within relevant institutions. The remaining risks in the CAP's ability to reverse the loss of farmland biodiversity still require better design, closer monitoring, greater transparency, and better engagement with farmers. Additionally, greater involvement of scientists is needed to guide the CAP toward restoring farmland biodiversity while accounting for synergies and trade‐offs with other objectives.