University of Tasmania
Browse

File(s) under permanent embargo

Integrating biological and social values when prioritizing places for biodiversity conservation

journal contribution
posted on 2023-05-18, 04:22 authored by Whitehead, AL, Kujala, H, Ives, CD, Gordon, A, Lentini, PE, Wintle, BA, Nicholson, E, Raymond, CM
The consideration of information on social values in conjunction with biological data is critical for achieving both socially acceptable and scientifically defensible conservation planning outcomes. However, the influence of social values on spatial conservation priorities has received limited attention and is poorly understood. We present an approach that incorporates quantitative data on social values for conservation and social preferences for development into spatial conservation planning. We undertook a public participation GIS survey to spatially represent social values and development preferences and used species distribution models for 7 threatened fauna species to represent biological values. These spatially explicit data were simultaneously included in the conservation planning software Zonation to examine how conservation priorities changed with the inclusion of social data. Integrating spatially explicit information about social values and development preferences with biological data produced prioritizations that differed spatially from the solution based on only biological data. However, the integrated solutions protected a similar proportion of the species’ distributions, indicating that Zonation effectively combined the biological and social data to produce socially feasible conservation solutions of approximately equivalent biological value. We were able to identify areas of the landscape where synergies and conflicts between different value sets are likely to occur. Identification of these synergies and conflicts will allow decision makers to target communication strategies to specific areas and ensure effective community engagement and positive conservation outcomes.

History

Publication title

Conservation Biology

Volume

28

Issue

4

Pagination

992-1003

ISSN

0888-8892

Department/School

Tasmanian Institute of Agriculture (TIA)

Publisher

Blackwell Publishing Inc

Place of publication

350 Main St, Malden, USA, Ma, 02148

Rights statement

Copyright 2014 Society for Conservation Biology

Repository Status

  • Restricted

Socio-economic Objectives

Assessment and management of Antarctic and Southern Ocean ecosystems

Usage metrics

    University Of Tasmania

    Exports

    RefWorks
    BibTeX
    Ref. manager
    Endnote
    DataCite
    NLM
    DC