Case studies of biodiversity offsetting: voices from the ground — a critical briefing note from Friends of the Earth

Friends of the Earth rep­re­sent some of the strongest crit­ics to Bio­di­ver­sity Off­sets both as a con­cept and in prac­tice. They have pre­pared a short brief­ing note enti­tled “Case stud­ies of bio­di­ver­sity off­set­ting: voices from the ground” includ­ing a crit­i­cal view on sev­eral bio­di­ver­sity off­set cases from the UK, France and Aus­tralia. Read more here and find a short intro­duc­tion pasted below.

Intro­duc­tion

A con­tentious new pol­icy being pur­sued by the UK Gov­ern­ment will lead to a loss of bio­di­ver­sity and local nat­ural areas for com­mu­ni­ties. Bio­di­ver­sity Off­set­ting could be intro­duced into Eng­lish plan­ning pol­icy this year despite a lack of evi­dence that it works to pro­tect nature. Bio­di­ver­sity Off­set­ting promises to make good the dam­age done to nature by cre­at­ing equiv­a­lent nature else­where, but in doing so, it masks the loss of impor­tant nat­ural spaces for com­mu­ni­ties. It also pre­tends that nature in all its com­plex­ity can sim­ply be recre­ated in a new loca­tion. What’s more, it is a dan­ger­ous dis­trac­tion from the need to do more to pro­tect nature and have a more envi­ron­men­tally sus­tain­able econ­omy. Sim­i­lar pro­pos­als are being put for­ward by the Euro­pean Com­mis­sion which could intro­duce trad­ing of nature areas across the EU. Friends of the Earth1 and Fern2 have warned of the risks asso­ci­ated with bio­di­ver­sity off­set­ting. Now for the first time, we have brought together the voices of com­mu­ni­ties speak­ing out about what off­set­ting is allow­ing on the ground. These case stud­ies are a wake-up call show­ing how unscrupu­lous devel­op­ers will use off­set­ting to jus­tify dam­ag­ing devel­op­ment if it is intro­duced into plan­ning policy.

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Case studies of biodiversity offsetting: voices from the ground — a critical briefing note from Friends of the Earth — 1 Comment

  1. I have recently been offered a doc­tor­ate research (PhD) place at Rmit Uni­ver­sity in Mel­bourne, Vic­to­ria. although I am still strug­gling with find­ing funding/scholarship for it, but hope­ful that with this net­work I can be helped to accom­plish my research. My research topic is “The poten­tial of bio­di­ver­sity off­sets in min­ing for wider appli­ca­tion”. With CRICOS code 079818E, Location/Campus City Cam­pus, Offered pro­gram dura­tion 4 year(s). While I didn’t want to be pas­sion­ate and a cri­tique about bio­di­ver­sity off­sets prac­tices, since 2008 when I learned of the prac­tice, I observed some mis­match in ecosys­tems regard­ing my expe­ri­ence of impact assess­ment stud­ies that I have been involved in devel­op­ing coun­tries in Uganda (Africa) as a whole and the off­sets them­selves. Thus, I decided to develop my career focused on the bio­di­ver­sity off­set prac­tices. Since then my con­cerns have been, the net loss and net gain is only tied to enlisted species of IUCN which dis­re­gards the below ground and space bio­di­ver­sity uncon­sid­ered. Thus my research prob­lem state­ment is that “The effi­ciency of bio­di­ver­sity off­set areas to restore species in entirety from the sites of adverse impacts is not clear”. In addi­tion, the net loss to bal­ance with the net gain con­sid­ered in the inter­ac­tion regimes could effi­ciently work fairly since bio­di­ver­sity dif­fers at spa­tial and tem­po­ral dis­tri­b­u­tion scales. The dis­tri­b­u­tion may include habi­tats in below ground, in land­scape, in space and gene pool. Bio­di­ver­sity off­set prac­tices are com­monly used in exten­sive land use changes such as infra­struc­tural devel­op­ment projects that affect areas of species of con­ser­va­tion con­cern. Vis­i­bly from small-large scale land use changes affect bio­di­ver­sity in its com­po­si­tion of abun­dance and diver­sity. How­ever com­pen­sa­tion for any resid­ual sig­nif­i­cant, adverse impacts that can­not be avoided, min­imised and/or reha­bil­i­tated or restored, in order to achieve no net loss or a net gain of bio­di­ver­sity is con­sid­er­ably chal­lenged. The off­set­ting should con­sider not only the net loss or a net gain of bio­di­ver­sity but also beyond the species such as car­bon stocks. Cur­rently off­sets are com­monly prac­ticed in min­ing devel­op­ment projects in coun­tries with well-established poli­cies and laws. Yet the envi­ron­men­tal changes are trig­gered by the bio­di­ver­sity loss. The idea of bio­di­ver­sity off­sets is con­tro­ver­sial to some in the con­ser­va­tion com­mu­nity; the fear is that that the use of off­sets could encour­age reg­u­la­tors to allow projects with severe impacts on bio­di­ver­sity to go ahead as long as they offered off­sets to com­pen­sate, and allow com­pa­nies to leave sig­nif­i­cant impacts in areas affected by projects as long as they under­took con­ser­va­tion work else­where. Fur­ther, in poor con­di­tion this might con­tinue dete­ri­o­rat­ing for­ever because there was no require­ment or incen­tive for a change in man­age­ment and yet in con­ser­va­tion terms putting that site into bet­ter man­age­ment would be a key pri­or­ity (Defra 2012). This research is antic­i­pated to strengthen the bio­di­ver­sity off­set prac­tice, guide pro­po­nents on where and how much bio­di­ver­sity requires being an off­set, and inform the pol­icy review to includ­ing find­ings on the species response. Advise on the use of man­age­ment plans through the appli­ca­tion of base­line stud­ies and include a new chap­ter on the envi­ron­men­tal man­age­ment plan (EMP) as a tool for devel­op­ment. Con­ser­va­tion orga­ni­za­tions will need the use of new approach by used the study.

    I am chal­leng­ing the pro­mot­ers, until I have found out the effi­ciency that this is a good prac­tice in con­ser­va­tion and can be pro­moted by governments.

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