DATA AVAILABILITY STATEMENT
This article does not use or report original or secondary data.1. Over recent decades, our understanding of climate change has accelerated greatly,
but unfortunately, observable impacts have increased in tandem. Both mitigation
and adaptation have not progressed at the level or scale warranted by our collective
knowledge on climate change. More effective approaches to engage people on
current and future anthropogenic climate change effects are urgently needed.
2. Here, we show how species whose distributions are shifting in response to climate
change, that is, ‘species-on-
the-
move’,
present an opportunity to engage people
with climate change by linking to human values, and our deep connections with
the places in which we live, in a locally relevant yet globally coherent narrative.
3. Species-on-
the-
move
can impact ecosystem structure and function, food security,
human health, livelihoods, culture and even the climate itself through feedback to
the climate system, presenting a wide variety of potential pathways for people to
understand that climate change affects them personally as individuals.
4. Citizen science focussed on documenting changes in biodiversity is one approach
to foster a deeper engagement on climate change. However, other possible
avenues, which may offer potential to engage people currently unconnected
with nature, include arts, games or collaborations with rural agriculture (e.g. new
occurrences of pest species) or fisheries organisations (e.g. shifting stocks) or
healthcare providers (e.g. changing distributions of disease vectors).
5. Through the importance we place on the aspects of life impacted by the
redistribution of species around us, species-on-
the-
move
offer emotional
pathways to connect with people on the complex issue of climate change in
profound ways that have the potential to engender interest and action on climate
change.An Australian Research Council Future Fellowship.https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/25758314am2024Biochemistry, Genetics and Microbiology (BGM)SDG-13:Climate actionSDG-15:Life on lan
