The controversial issue of biodiversity protection in Human Modified Landscapes (HMLs) is the subject of an article on Mongabay.com website.

While everyone seems to agree that protecting primary forests is vital, such forests are rare and expensive to protect. There are increasing efforts to conserve biodiversity through better managing HMLs which include secondary forests, selectively logged forests and lands devoted to sustainable agriculture (such as agroforestry).

A new paper in Trends in Ecology and Evolution, looks at “setting up a framework that connects disturbance, land use, ecosystem services and biodiversity,” says the article.

The paper provides a valuable conceptual model showing the results of different styles of forest management. The model demonstrates how the amount of old-growth forest habitat and connectivity among forest patches is important to natural regeneration and that management such as forest restoration is vital to the success of biodiversity conservation HMLs.

The article goes on to look at the debate over what is better for biodiversity: land sparing (setting aside intact ecosystems such as in national parks while intensive agriculture occurs outside these areas) or land sharing (where land supports a mix of forest components and agriculture such as through agroforestry).

Examples are provided of successful biodiversity conservation under both land sparing and land sharing. Either way, biodiversity is threatened. The real challenge lies in making “wildlife-friendly farming more profitable and competitive.”

Read the full story: Still hope for tropical biodiversity in human modified landscapes