The benefits of land sparing are limited by invasions of alien species
- Magdalena Lenda,
- Piotr Skórka,
- Johannes Knops,
- Dorota Kotowska,
- Dawid Moroń,
- Hugh Possingham
Dorota Kotowska
Institute of Nature Conservation Polish Academy of Sciences
Author ProfileAbstract
Globally, agriculture intensification is a dominant driver of
biodiversity loss. The concepts of land sparing and land sharing are
alternatives to seek a balance between maintaining and restoring
biodiversity while producing adequate food. To date, land sparing has
been suggested as the best strategy to maintain biodiversity, but very
few intact lands remain on Earth for sparing. Recently, international
policies for nature conservation have proposed removing land from
agricultural management to meet the need for more land sparing. However,
the idea of land sparing has not considered the risk of biological
invasions in abandoned land. Many abandoned agricultural lands are
colonized by invasive species, creating monospecific patches with low
biodiversity. Such invasions have cascading effects on other trophic
levels and decrease ecosystem services in nearby agricultural fields,
which negatively impacts yield. Moreover, invaded abandoned fields have
lower biodiversity than extensively managed agricultural land. Thus, the
risk of inducing plant invasions and triggering detrimental impacts on
biodiversity, ecosystem services, and agricultural yields limits land
sparing from abandonment as a conservation strategy. Our simulations
also suggest that land sharing may be the best solution for sustaining
biodiversity when the risk of invasion is high.