FACULTY OF NATURAL SCIENCES

1. FACULTY OF NATURAL SCIENCES What is Conservation Biology? Rich Knight, Biodiversity & Conservation Biology UWCknight.rich[at]gmail.com

2. A FEW HISTORICAL HIGHLIGHTS OF THE USE OF UNSUSTAINABLE PRACTICES AND THEIR COSTS • Unsustainable land use practices have been around for thousands of years. • Following the colonisation of new terri-tories, humans have overexploited va-rious resources with the result that people have been responsible for ex-tinctions for thousands of years. • Extinctions are a cost of not being sustainable. • Aristotle, in the Greek period, commented on the widespread destruction of the Baltic forests. At the same time the forests of southern Asia were being felled to meet the burgeoning ship-building industry. • The arid lands of Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran are the result of massive exploitation of fragile woodlands.

3. A BRIEF HISTORY OF CONSERVATION • Early conservation was derived from philosophical and religious beliefs about the relationship between man and the natural world. • Sacred groves were important in Europe and India in pre-Christian times. • India has had protected areas since the fourth century B.C. • In the Middle Ages, the European royalty and nobility set aside preserves for their recreational use. • In South Africa, the local chief Sakhile in Transkei decreed that local forests around Dwesa were royal and forbade hunting in them. • The Polish authorities set aside a na-ture reserve in 1564.

4. PHILOSOPHIES OF CONSERVATION • Formalised philosophies of conservation biology developed into two branches during the late 19th century and early 20th century. • Preservationists wanted pure wilderness based on a spiritual appreciation for nature. • Conservationists advocated a resource-based approach to the management of natural resources. • Preservationist John Muir believed that the spiritual benefits of nature were superior to the material benefits gained by exploiting nature. • Conservationist Gifford Pinchot believed that natural resources should be used for the benefit of humanity - “the greatest good of the greatest number [of people] for the longest time.”

5. THE EVOLUTIONARY – ECOLOGICAL LAND ETHIC • It was with the publication of Aldo Leopold’s ‘A Sand County Almanac’ in 1949 that a third philosophy within conservation biology was born – that of the Evolutionary - Ecological Land Ethic. • This philosophy articulated that the complicated and integrated systems of integrated processes and components that make up the natural world functioned in fashion similar to a ‘fine Swiss watch’. • Leopold saw ecosystems existing within equilibria, a view subsequently replaced by non-equilibrium views. • His writings were inspired by his experience of the ‘Dust Bowl Era’ on the great plains of America. • Even today, the science of conservation is still developing.

7. THE GUIDING PRINCIPLES OF CONSERVATION BIOLOGY • Three guiding principles for Conservation Biology have emerged: • Evolutionary Change, • Dynamic Ecology, • Human Change.

8. PRINCIPLE 1: EVOLUTIONARY CHANGE • This is based on the work of population geneticist Theodosius Dobzhansky. • He stated that "nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution". • Evolution is the most plausible explanation for the immense pattern of biodiversity that exists on the planet. • The genetic composition of organisms is continuously changing. • Consequently the goal of this principle is to allow populations to change in response to environmental changes through adaptations.

9. PRINCIPLE 2: DYNAMIC ECOLOGY • The ecological world is seen as dynamic; largely functioning through non-equilibrium principles. • Dynamic ecology specifi-cally rejects the equilibrium viewpoint. • This non-equilibrium view sees the regulation of ecological structure as not being maintained through internally generated processes but through external processes, in the form of natural processes.

10. MORE ON NON-EQUILIBRIUM PROCESSES • We know that non-equilibrium pro-cesses maintain almost all ecosy-stems. • Consequently, ecosystems consist of patches and mosaics of habitats that are not internally uniform with clearly defined species assem-blages. • The critical focus of this principle is the integration of non-equilibrium processes within a hierarchy of species interactions and the recognition that ecosystems are open with fluxes of species, materials and energy.

11. PRINCIPLE 3: THE HUMAN PRESENCE • Humans are participants within both na-tural and perturbed ecosystems and their presence within ecosystems needs to be recognised and accounted for. • Native human cultures form historical components of the landscape and must be explicitly recognised as a form of diversity in the same way that biodiver-sity is. • Conservation efforts cannot wall off nature to safe guard it from humans because: • Ecosystems must be seen as open systems, • Nature reserves inevitably exist within a surrounding landscape that is intensively utilised by humans. • This principle explicitly integrates humans into conservation practice.

12. ASPECTS OF HUMAN INTEGRATION INTO CONSERVATION BIOLOGY – CONSERVATION AND ECONOMICS • Certain principles of economic theory are re-quired for the practice of conservation biology. • Much of resource economics is based on the willingness to pay for certain goods and ser-vices. • Nature conservation is being seen as a form of land use and its value for generating capital through tourism is compared to other economic activities. • The development of environmental audits using species and habitats as the foci is still in its infancy. • The three axioms of ecological economics are likely to have a long term impact on the value on biodiversity. These axioms are: endless expansion into a limited space is impossible; endless use of a finite resource is impossible and all the elements of the biosphere are interconnected.

13. THE WORLD CONSERVATION STRATEGY • People’s realisation of their roles in determining their future on earth prompted the development in the 1980’s of the World Conservation Strategy. • The strategy has three objectives: • The maintenance of the ecological processes that life depends on; • The sustainable use of ecosystems and their component species; • The conservation of genetic diversity. • The revised version is entitled ‘Caring for the Earth: a Strategy for Sustainable Living.’ A South African version was authored by John Yeld in 1997.

14. ASPECTS OF HUMAN INTEGRATION INTO CONSERVATION BIOLOGY – CONSERVATION AND POLITICS • It is naïve to think that conservation bio-logy should be apolitical despite the fact that it should be for all people. • The only realistic paths to sustainable conservation are through the provision of a reasonable standard of living for all people globally. • This can only be achieved through politi-cal systems that encourage some people to accept lower standards of living so that others may escape the effects of desperate poverty. • Conservation also needs the support of party politicians at all levels, which requires conservation biologists to invest time in lobbying and education. • Lobbying and education need continuous attention and strategic planning.

15. ASPECTS OF HUMAN INTEGRATION INTO CONSERVATION BIOLOGY – CONSERVATION AND WORLD SUMMITS • The major themes of the United Nations Conference on the Environment and Development held in Rio de Janeiro in June 1992 were the relationships between: • Unequal access to resources, • Unsustainable development generally and • The loss of biodiversity in particular. • Those people and politicians from the developed northern industrialised nations have more to lose so they have had difficulty: • In participating in this discourse, • Participating in the design of global institutions to address the roles of inequality in environmental degradation.

16. THE WORLD SUMMIT ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT • The United Nations World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) accepted the following: • “We, the representatives of the peoples of the world, assembled at the WSSD in Johannesburg, South Africa, from 2 to 4 Sept. 2002, reaffirm our commitment to sustainable development.” • “We commit ourselves to building a humane, equitable and caring global society …” • “At the beginning of this Summit, the children … spoke to us … that the future belongs to them, and … challenged … us to ensure that through our actions they will inherit a world free of the indignity and indecency occasioned by poverty, environ-mental degradation and patterns of unsustainable development.” • “As part of our response … all of us … are united and moved by a … sense that we urgently need to create a new and brighter world of hope.”

17. THE WORLD SUMMIT ON SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT 2 • Continuing from the previous slide: • “Accordingly, we assume a collective responsi-bility to advance and strengthen the … pillars of sustainable development - economic deve-lopment, social development and environmental protection at the local, national, regional and global levels.” • “From this continent, the cradle of humanity, we declare, through the Plan of Implementation of the World Summit on Sustainable Development and the present Declaration, our responsibility to one another, to the greater community of life and to our children.” • “Recognizing that humankind is at a crossroads, we have united … to make a determined effort to respond positively to the need to produce a practical and visible plan to bring about poverty eradication and human development.”

18. ASPECTS OF HUMAN INTEGRATION INTO CONSERVATION BIOLOGY – CONSERVATION AND STANDARDS OF LIVING • Human expectations of a decent standard of living include food, shelter, water, space, education and a freedom of choice. • The problem of human pressure on natural resources is further complicated by the global problem of population growth. • The world population reached 6.5 billion on 25 February 2006. • By 2050, an estimated 9.22 billion people will exist. Most of these people will be living in the developing nations of the world. • Kenya will increase from about 16.33 million in 1980 to 64.82 million in 2050. • Columbia will increase from 26.58 million in 1980 to 64.53 million in 2050. • South Africa will only increase from 29.25 million in 1980 to 33.00 million in 2050, probably because of AIDS.

19. ASPECTS OF HUMAN INTEGRATION INTO CONSERVATION BIOLOGY – CONSERVATION AND SELF-SUFFICIENCY • Many countries that, a few years ago, were self-sufficient in food, now have to import food. • Hungry and dissatisfied people do not always make the best use of their living space. • They tend to make extensive rather than intensive use of the land. • Landless people migrate to unoccupied public lands (i.e. natural vegetation). • The techniques that could improve the situation (at least in the short term)are generally unavailable or beyond local budgets. • Government indifference (as shown by their priorities) is one of the main causes of hunger.

20. MAN-MADE CONSERVATION PROBLEMS – UNNECESSARY WASTEFULNESS AND ITS CONSEQUENCES • Wastefulness is not the confined to the poor. Wealthy societies are even more wasteful. • In many developing countries, large tracts of land are wastefully cleared to provide exports to these wealthy countries. • The fishing industries of the wealthy nations have collapsed. The fishing industries of de-veloping countries have also collapsed due to local exploitation for export to the wealthy nations or their inability to police fishing rights leased to wealthy countries. • Overexploitation can become habitat destruction and cause species extinction. • The loss of tropical rainforests is serious. Other ecosystems under threat are wetlands, coastal areas, arid and semi-arid rangelands.

21. THE FUTURE SURVIVAL/SUCCESS OF CONSERVATION • Conservation needs to become user-friendly to gain and maintain public support now and in the future. • Conservation needs to recognise and include lo-cal cultural diversity. Native human cultures form historical components of the landscape. • For conservation to work, people must want it rat-her than have it imposed upon them. People will only want conservation if they understand it and can see that they benefit from it. • The University of the Western Cape (UWC) must be almost unique among Southern African higher education institutions in that conservation is explicitly recognised within its mission statement and it is one of only two South African campuses that have officially recognised Nature Reserves. UWC is also fortunate in having an Environmental Education and Resource Unit (EERU).

22. CONCLUSIONDEFINING CONSERVATION BIOLOGY • Conservation may be defined as the management and sustainable use of the natural environment and natural resources for ethical reasons and the benefit of humanity. • Conservation biology is a multidisciplinary science focusing on biodiversity and its maintenance for human welfare. • The breadth of conservation biology extends beyond that of biology itself. • It focuses the knowledge and tools of all the integrated disciplines onto one issue – the maintenance of biodiversity. • Conservation biology's effectiveness is based on its originality and its scientific rigour. • The greatest challenge is to ensure that scientific information is used effectively by those practicing conservation.