Complementarity, biodiversity viability analysis, and policy-based algorithms for conservation

Environmental Science & Policy 6 (2003) 311–328

This paper is available at:

Figure 1 in that paper presents an example showing how we can measure the loss of a region's capacity for balancing different needs of society (its "regional sustainability").

"Fig. 1. The consequences of any potential (or actual) change in land-use for
a region’s best-possible trade-offs curve. Trade-off curves are shown for
two scenarios for PNG; the y-axis reflects “forgone biodiversity protection”
and the x-axis reflects “opportunity costs” (units are based on coded
timber volumes (for further details, see Faith et al., 2001b)). The lower
curve reflects a case where there are no land-use constraints, with the
consequence that land-use allocations are possible that fall close to the
lower-left hand corner corresponding to high net benefits. The upper
curve is for a scenario in which high land-use intensity areas are lost
to biodiversity conservation. The capacity for cost-effective conservation
and corresponding high net benefits is reduced (for further details, see
Faith, 2001)."

Dr Dan Faith , Principal Research Scientist
Last Updated: 9 May 2010

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