New initiatives are being proposed to create knowledge-transfer mechanisms between biodiversity science and so-called ‘decision makers’ that are apparently ignoring some of the significant differences to which biodiversity governance is subject at different scales. Shifting scales seriously change the rules of knowledge transfer; some implications of this are explored. Appropriate scope and focus are vital for international initiatives. There is no substitute for the full development of local capacities, and the multinational lending agencies interested in the conservation of biodiversity, the achievement of the Millennium Development Goals, and others should support such national efforts and establish regional training facilities to help generate the human and basic institutional capacities needed.

No-take marine reserves are widely recognized as an effective conservation tool for protecting marine resources. Despite considerable empirical evidence that abundance and biomass of fished species increase within marine reserve boundaries, the potential for reserves to provide fisheries and conservation benefits to adjacent waters remains heavily debated. This paper uses statistical and population models to evaluate published empirical data on adult spillover from marine reserves and shows that spillover is a common phenomenon for species that respond positively to reserve protection, but at relatively small scales, detectable on average up to 800 m from reserve boundaries. At these small scales, local fisheries around reserves were likely unsustainable in 12 of 14 cases without the reserve, and spillover partially or fully offsets losses in catch due to reserve closure in the other two cases. For reserves to play a role in sustaining and replenishing larger-scale fished stocks, networks of reserves may be necessary, but as few exist this is difficult to evaluate. The results suggest reserves can simultaneously meet conservation objectives and benefit local fisheries adjacent to their boundaries.

Conserving natural vegetation cover is of critical importance for maintaining the ecological integrity and hydrological properties of large river basins (more than 100 000 km2). Recent estimates indicate that more than 700 000 km2 of Brazilian Amazon have already been deforested, and to reduce further losses and preserve the important natural and cultural resources in this region, large conservation areas have been created by the Brazilian government. The present study analysed land cover and land use change in the major watersheds of the Brazilian Amazon, in order to evaluate the current balance between deforestation and conservation of natural areas in the region. The results show that watersheds draining the southern part of the basin have suffered the highest deforestation rates, with the largest losses (8.3–20% of total basin area) occurring in the Madeira, Tapajós, Xingu, Araguaia and Tocantins river basins. Most large watersheds already have significant deforestation in their headwaters, which can affect hydrological functions and ecological sustainability. The greatest allocation of land for conservation was encountered in the Trombetas, Xingu and Negro watersheds, where conservation areas occupied 92.5, 56.9 and 50.6% of the total basin, respectively. While extensive areas of the Amazon biome have been deforested, on the scale of large watersheds there is a positive balance between conservation areas and deforestation, and on average the area delimited by conservation areas is more than three times larger than the deforested areas. An analysis by subwatersheds, however, indicates that certain regions have achieved more critical levels of deforestation, in some situations affecting more than 80% of the subwatersheds.

The simplistic portrayal of road development as a classic environment versus development debate may be because the indirect pathways connecting road building with environmental change are poorly understood. Recent road development in previously remote regions of Nicaragua provides an opportunity to investigate these pathways. This paper examines the effects of increased market access on household resource use on the Atlantic coast of Nicaragua. Specifically, it looks at shifting market flow and price changes for natural resources and corresponding fishing and farming decisions in communities with varying degrees of market access before and after road completion. Fisheries markets were more responsive to market access increases than agricultural markets. With increased access, fishers increasingly sold to non-local buyers, overall export of fisheries' products increased and markets for new products emerged. Prices of fisheries goods were higher with proximity to markets and availability of non-local export outlets, and prices for some were more stable after the road was completed. There were no observed changes in household fishing and farming investments during the year-long study, and therefore the environmental implications of increased market access remain uncertain. Longer-term studies and additional biological monitoring are needed to determine the full environmental consequences of market access.

Many marine ecosystems are depleted of living resources as a result of long-term overexploitation. Restoration plans should perhaps consider the entire ecosystem as opposed to single species, yet there is currently no suitable framework available for the design and comparison of whole-ecosystem restoration trajectories. This paper presents a novel addition to Ecopath with Ecosim's policy search routine, the ‘specific biomass’ objective function, which allows gaming scenarios to be run using selective fishing as a tool to rebuild depleted marine ecosystems or modify them into a preferred state. In this paper, restoration scenarios aimed to restore an ecosystem in Northern British Columbia to a state similar to the historic ecosystem of 1950 AD. Restoration plans that achieve restoration quickly tend to require a large sacrifice in fishery profits, while slower plans allow for continued harvest benefits. A convex relationship between profit and recovered biodiversity suggests that there may be an optimal rate of restoration. Cost-benefit analysis demonstrates that conservative restoration plans can offer a rate of return superior to bank interest when viewed as an investment in natural capital. Increasing the selectivity of fishing gear improves the economic outlook.

Production of belowground organic matter is critical to sustainability of salt marshes. It plays a role in vertical soil accretion, a process essential for salt marshes to maintain their relative elevation and persist as sea levels rise. This paper examines belowground production and soil carbon of a high-latitude saltmarsh in the St Lawrence Estuary (Québec, Canada), which had been subjected to six years of sheep grazing. In the seventh year, without sheep, organic matter production in grazed and ungrazed sections was assessed by examining harvests of plant litter, end-of-season standing crop, and the roots and rhizomes present in in-growth cores. Excepting salinity, porewater chemistry varied little. The grazed marsh had higher soil carbon density and belowground production, yet lower aboveground biomass. Grazing reduces plant litter and increases solar exposure, soil temperature (at this latitude, soil remained frozen until April) and evapotranspiration, thus raising soil salinity and nitrogen demand, the latter a driver of root production. Grazing may not be detrimental to soil carbon storage. Permitting certain types of grazing on restored salt marshes previously drained for agriculture would provide economic incentive to restore tidal flooding, because the natural carbon sink provided in the recovered marsh would make these lands eligible for carbon payments.

Poverty may be an important influence on the exploitation of marine resources in tropical developing countries. A number of studies have hypothesized that destructive fishing gears, which can degrade habitat, capture high proportions of juvenile fish and ultimately lead to reduced yields, are primarily used by the poorer segments of society. However, few studies have empirically tested this relationship. This paper examines relationships between the use of destructive seine nets and thirteen socioeconomic conditions in communities adjacent to three peri-urban marine protected areas in east Africa. Fishers using destructive gears were younger, less likely to have capital invested in the fishery, had lower fortnightly expenditures and were poorer in two multivariate indices of material style of life. Based on the two multivariate material style of life indices, a binary logistic regression model classified whether fishers used destructive gears with almost 70% accuracy. These findings are broadly consistent with the literature on poverty traps, which are situations in which the poor are unable to mobilize the resources required to overcome low-income situations and consequently engage in behaviour that may reinforce their own poverty. Managers aiming to reduce destructive gear use may need to partner with civil society and donors to help break poverty traps.

Fishing can have major impacts on the structure of coral reef ecosystems. Overfishing of herbivores is particularly detrimental, as it makes the coral system more likely to undergo shifts to macroalgal dominance in the event of coral mass mortality. Knowing when important processes, such as herbivory, are becoming brittle is important because it can provide an opportunity for managers to avoid undesirable ecosystem-level changes. This study investigates the impact of artisanal fishing on three important functional groups of herbivores (grazers, scrapers and excavators) on five coral-dominated reefs outside Zanzibar (Tanzania). There was a negative correlation between fishing pressure and fish biomass, abundance, diversity and species richness. Moreover, fishing had a negative influence on the demographic structure of functional groups, particularly excavators, manifesting itself as a skewness towards smaller individuals within populations. Artisanal fishing can have significant impacts on key functional groups of herbivorous reef fishes which may increase the vulnerability of coral reefs to undesirable ecosystem shifts.

Livestock grazing restrictions are a common practice in the protected areas of developing countries. Understanding the influence of these restrictions on livestock husbandry is critical because local people's livelihoods often depend on access to grazing lands and biodiversity conservation may be affected by grazing activities. Household surveys and government records were used to examine impacts of grazing restrictions on livestock composition and use of available forage resources in the Madi Valley of Chitwan National Park (Nepal) during early (1997) and late (2006) restriction policy periods. Households responded to grazing restrictions by reducing numbers of less productive cattle and high maintenance buffalo to offset forage demands, but there was no decrease in the number of goats. In 2006, average household fodder biomass (3.4 t yr−1) available from agricultural land was adequate for the average household livestock units (3.3 t yr−1) requirement. Although most households ‘stall fed’ livestock as an adjustment to the new policy, about 30% still depended on community forests and parklands for livestock rearing. Higher ‘stall feeding’ reduced grazing pressure and increased forest cover but demanded more fodder cutting, which has the potential to increase human/wildlife interactions, particularly with tigers in the buffer zone community forests.