Biodiversity
Biodiversity is declining faster than at any time in human history, undermining ecosystem resilience, productivity and adaptability, in turn fuelling unprecedented risk to our societal and economic systems. Biodiversity cannot be fully accounted for economically, but by not accounting for it at all, we have totally undervalued nature and hugely increased its degradation. As the Dasgupta Review clearly argued, nature must be at the heart of economics and our thinking; we cannot afford for it to be absent in our accounting.
At Highlands Rewilding, we are putting biodiversity at the heart of our work. Rewilding and nature restoration activities aim to produce robust natural systems that deliver a wide range of economic and non-economic benefits to people. These benefits can include carbon sequestration from new native trees or reduction of emissions through restored peatland; increases in the diversity and abundance of wildlife; or cleaner water and flood prevention. The interactions that generate these benefits are “vast, complex, and often poorly understood” and therefore often hidden or missed altogether, despite providing resilience to underlying ecosystem function (Integrating Biodiversity into Natural Capital Assessments).
The natural capital market is therefore developing methodologies to quantify these natural systems, and to measure their change over time. This measured change will then form the basis of credits which can be sold to companies looking to have a positive impact on the environment, through net-zero, nature positive ambitions, and hence provide a diversification in land-based income streams for landowners. Biodiversity measurement is a fundamental component of this.
A tiny sample of the range of innovative techniques, technologies and suppliers we use to gather, record, interpret and analyse data as part of our science-driven approach to increasing natural capital.
To show real, verifiable, and quantifiable changes in natural systems, it is vital to get a good baseline before any site changes are implemented, using the best available science and methodologies.
At Highlands Rewilding, we have worked with a fantastic range of innovative startups, academics, and local ecologists, to establish our baseline of both biodiversity and carbon stocks, and to identify how best to measure and track changes over time. Through this data-driven natural capital baselining, including tracking biodiversity uplift, we aim to deliver landholders viable financial returns.
As outlined in our yearly Natural Capital Reports, this baselining has included eDNA analysis of flora and fauna in soils and water; drone surveys of our existing trees and shrubs; camera trapping and audio recording. We are also using SoilMentor, a farmer friendly soil health management app that gives us the opportunity to track in-field changes as we see them on a daily basis. These innovative services, among many others, sit alongside more traditional, on-the-ground survey methods for birds, pollinators and plants. These data will fit into emerging credit development and verification schemes as well as informing our habitat management.
By assessing baselines before making any changes, land managers can ensure they are capturing the most accurate view of the current state of their land, creating a base to assess future increases in the natural capital. Through the various reports and data sets created, this process will also tease out the best interventions for different habitats and aspects of biodiversity. It also identifies the nature-rich pockets that already exist; the seed of any future natural regeneration.
It is vital that we measure and value biodiversity sufficiently to tackle the root causes of its rapid ongoing loss, and to reward land management that will preserve the species and ecosystems we all depend on.