Reductions in global biodiversity loss predicted from conservation spending

Abstract

Halting global biodiversity loss is central to both the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) and United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)1,2, but success to date has been very limited3–5. A critical determinant of overall strategic success (or failure) is the financing committed to biodiversity6–9; however, financing decisions are still hindered by considerable uncertainty over what any investment is likely to achieve6–9.. For greater effectiveness, we need an evidence-based model (EBM)10–12 showing how conservation spending quantitatively reduces the rate of loss. Here, we empirically quantify how i$14.4 billion of conservation investment reduced biodiversity loss across 109 signatory countries between 1996 and 2008, by an average 29% per country. We also show that biodiversity change in signatory countries can be predicted with high accuracy, using a dual model that combines the positive impact of conservation investment with the negative impact of economic, agricultural and population growth (i.e. human development pressures)13–18. Decision-makers can use this dual model to forecast the improvement that any proposed biodiversity budget would achieve under various scenarios of human development pressure, comparing those forecasts to any chosen policy target (including the CBD and SDGs). Importantly, we further find that spending impacts shrink as human development pressures grow, implying that funding may need to increase over time. The model therefore offers a flexible tool for balancing the SDGs of human development and biodiversity, by predicting the dynamic changes needed in conservation finance as human development proceeds