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© 2024. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.

Abstract

Carbon crediting and land offsets for biodiversity protection have been developed to tackle the challenges of increasing greenhouse gas emissions and the loss of global biodiversity. Unfortunately, these two mechanisms are not optimal when considered separately. Focusing solely on carbon capture—the primary goal of most carbon-focused crediting and offsetting commitments—often results in the establishment of non-native, fast-growing monocultures that negatively affect biodiversity and soil-related ecosystem services. Soil contributes a vast proportion of global biodiversity and contains traces of aboveground organisms. Here, we outline a carbon and biodiversity co-crediting scheme based on the multi-kingdom molecular and carbon analyses of soil samples, along with remote sensing estimation of aboveground carbon as well as video and acoustic analyses-based monitoring of aboveground macroorganisms. Combined, such a co-crediting scheme could help halt biodiversity loss by incentivising industry and governments to account for biodiversity in carbon sequestration projects more rigorously, explicitly and equitably than they currently do. In most cases, this would help prioritise protection before restoration and help promote more socially and environmentally sustainable land stewardship towards a ‘nature positive’ future.

Details

Title
Towards a co-crediting system for carbon and biodiversity
Author
Tedersoo, Leho 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Sepping, Jaan 2 ; Morgunov, Alexey S 3 ; Kiik, Martin 4 ; Esop, Kristiina 5 ; Rosenvald, Raul 6 ; Hardwick, Kate 7 ; Breman, Elinor 7 ; Purdon, Rachel 7 ; Groom, Ben 8 ; Venmans, Frank 9 ; Kiers, E Toby 10 ; Antonelli, Alexandre 11   VIAFID ORCID Logo 

 Mycology and Microbiology Center, University of Tartu, Tartu, Estonia; College of Science, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia 
 Mycology and Microbiology Center, University of Tartu, Tartu, Estonia 
 Department of Chemistry, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK 
 Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King's College London, London, UK 
 Estonian Business School, Tallinn, Estonia 
 Institute of Ecology and Earth Sciences, University of Tartu, Estonia 
 Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Richmond, UK 
 Department of Economics, University of Exeter Business School, Exeter, UK; Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK 
 Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK 
10  Amsterdam Institute for Life and Environment, section Ecology & Evolution, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, Netherlands 
11  Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, Richmond, UK; Gothenburg Global Biodiversity Centre, Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden; Department of Plant Sciences, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK 
Pages
18-28
Section
OPINIONS
Publication year
2024
Publication date
Jan 2024
Publisher
John Wiley & Sons, Inc.
e-ISSN
25722611
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
ProQuest document ID
2901227174
Copyright
© 2024. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.