Following up the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment
Alison Holt
bioSUSTAINABILITY International Project Office
Environment Department, University of York
E-mail:  envr12@york.ac.uk
At the BES Annual Meeting this year there was a stronger feeling than ever that ecologists believe their science is important for addressing issues of biodiversity conservation and sustainability, and through this we can help to solve environmental problems in society. Many ecologists now recognise that producing such science requires working across disciplines and that it is essential to effectively communicate the resulting knowledge if it is to aid the policy making process.
This new emphasis on addressing real-world problems in an interdisciplinary way was evident in the choice of plenary speakers at the meeting. For instance, the Tansley lecture given by Professor Peter Vitousek showed how working in an interdisciplinary team could bring an understanding of how ecological, evolutionary and cultural processes interact, using the Hawaiian Islands as a model system. The BES lecture by Sir Gordon Conway showed the clear benefits to international development of working across ecology, agricultural science, social sciences, economics and politics - in fact this talk demonstrated the necessity of doing so.
This focus on applied issues was also reflected in the choice of workshops, particularly the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (MA) and BES Science into Policy workshops.
The first of these outlined the aims of the MA followed by a general synthesis of the Assessment’s findings. Of particular interest, the workshop also identified knowledge gaps which need to be addressed in order to answer important policy questions relating to ecosystem services and human well-being. Filling these gaps is seen as a major challenge to the ecological community and include: developing global and national biodiversity monitoring systems that can be used to assess condition and trends in ecosystem services; gathering information on non-marketed ecosystem services; improving our understanding in quantitative terms of the relationships between biodiversity changes and changes in ecosystem services, allowing predictions to be made for particular places and times; assessing the economic consequences of changes in ecosystem services and the relationship between ecosystem services and human well-being – in other words, uncovering links between ecological and social processes and seeking to understand how changes in human attitudes and behaviours affect ecosystem services.
The ensuing discussion concluded that the ecological community should respond to the challenge presented by these gaps in our knowledge by targeting new research in these areas. To do this effectively it is essential for ecologists to work with scientists from other disciplines. Furthermore, research in these areas, especially those areas that would feed directly into policy, need to be seen as funding priorities.
Conducting the research needed to address the knowledge gaps identified by the MA will take time, but the BES Science into Policy workshop highlighted what we can do in the meantime. The workshop showed how ecologists can offer sound ecological science as an evidence base for decisions made by parliament and government departments. It was clear that the BES is inundated with requests for briefings and representation at policy meetings. However, the workshop discussion also highlighted the fact that the BES can only contribute ecological expertise to issues that, for the most part, require expertise from across many disciplines.
Addressing these gaps in our scientific knowledge by stimulating the highest quality research on biodiversity and making our research policy-relevant, whilst at the same time convincing funding bodies that this is where their expenditure would provide the most return, is certainly a challenge. For instance, no single funding body or organisation can at present provide sufficient resources to fund the required research. However, ecologists can play a key role by convincing others (scientists, organisations, conventions, governments) of the common goals and by collectively putting pressure on funding bodies to recognise the importance of such areas of research to society. Effective communication of existing scientific knowledge to policy-makers while we fill in the gaps will also be vital. But how can ecologists start the ball rolling?
DIVERSITAS is an international science programme that is already aiming to address the very gaps in knowledge identified by the MA, with an ambitious science programme to stimulate scientists, conventions, agencies and organisations. Its work is completed through three core projects: 1) bioDISCOVERY, which aims to develop the scientific basis for monitoring and observation to understand and predict changes in biodiversity; 2) ecoSERVICES, which seeks to understand the link between changes in ecosystem functioning and ecosystem services and the human response to changes in those services; and 3) bioSUSTAINABILITY, a programme to guide policy and decision making for sustainable use of biodiversity by evaluating current conservation policies, studying the socio-economic drivers of biodiversity loss and understanding how society chooses and makes decisions about biodiversity.
The International Project Office of bioSUSTAINABILITY is in the Environment Department of the University of York. bioSUSTAINABILITY aims to stimulate scientists to work within its framework and is an ever-growing network of scientists across many disciplines who are interested in working to conserve biodiversity and to make this science policy-relevant. The bioSUSTAINABILITY science network is therefore already an excellent resource. By taking advantage of this resource or by taking part in bioSUSTAINABILITY, ecologists can begin to meet the challenges uncovered by the MA.
If you want to know more about bioSUSTAINABILITY the secretariat are more than happy to give a talk or seminar at your institution. For the bioSUSTAINABILITY science plan see their website. Contact Dr Alison Holt at: tel 01904 434789; envr12@york.ac.uk.
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