BECC - Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services in a Changing Climate - is a new strategic research initiative in cooperation between Lund University and the University of Gothenburg. In Lund it is hosted by the Centre for Environmental and Climate Research (CEC) at the Faculty of Science. BECC strives for a better understanding of the impacts of climate change and land use decisions on terrestrial ecosystems and biodiversity, addressing the consequences of ecosystem changes for human beings and socio-economic systems. The vision of BECC is to advance interdisciplinary research approaches that contribute to the sustainable management of ecosystems and biodiversity in a rapidly changing world.
More information can be found at http://www.cec.lu.se/forskning/becc
Job assignments
The aim of the project is to scientifically evaluate policy options combining adaptation and mitigation strategies to climate change with conservation of biodiversity and ecosystem resilience. It focuses on how different spatial strategies to preserve biodiversity in agricultural areas on the one hand affect the conservation of rare species at regional and national scales and on the other hand local species richness and associated ecosystem services.
Integrating conservation efforts in agricultural production areas may be a means to increase landscape-wide biodiversity and production of ecosystem services that can be contrasted with the creation of protected areas. For example, small but widely dispersed semi-natural pastures may contribute to maintaining ecosystem services, but be of small conservation value if they are seriously affected by stochastic extinctions or negative edge effects such as spill-over of agriculturally subsidized organisms. Changes in the community composition in semi-natural pastures may also feed back on their ability to promote ecosystem services. An optimal conservation strategy may also be affected by current climate change, which in addition to direct effects on species distributions may result in agricultural intensification through increased demands of fiber for biofuels. The key of the work is to determine the trade-offs among different strategies to integrate conservation with production in terms of conservation goals, ecosystem service flows and resilience under climate change.
The research will focus on plant and insect biodiversity connected to semi-natural pastures in farmland that are maintained and managed due to their biodiversity values by incentives from agri-environment schemes. We will study multiple ecosystem services such as biodiversity, pollination, carbon sequestration and agricultural production, by:
(1) Synthesizing current knowledge about effects of conservation and management of semi-natural areas in farmland on biodiversity conservation and multiple ecosystem services, in particular whether the consequences depend on landscape context.
(2) Evaluating effects of different spatial strategies for conserving semi-natural habitats (integrated management vs protected areas) on biodiversity and multiple ecosystem services using modelling and/or statistical analyses of existing datasets.
(3) Empirically evaluate interacting effects of policies/strategies to preserve semi-natural pastures and policies/strategies to ameliorate agricultural intensification of the wider landscape on both the preservation of biodiversity and on ecosystem services such as pollination.
The successful candidate is expected to be involved in several multidisciplinary research projects within the BECC programme. The candidate will also take part in and organizing seminars and workshops at the Centre for Environmental and Climate Research (CEC).
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