Researcher Stockholm Resilience Centre, Stockholm University Stockholm, Sweden
Background/Question/Methods
Ecosystems around the world are at risk of critical transitions due to increasing anthropogenic pressures and climate change. Yet it is unclear where the risks are higher or where in the world ecosystems are more vulnerable. Here I measure resilience of primary productivity proxies for marine and terrestrial ecosystems globally. The analysis applies the traditional early warning signals based on critical slowing down; and adapts the methods to include critical speeding up metrics, and fractal dimension. To that end, gross primary productivity, terrestrial ecosystem respiration, and chlorophyll-a concentration were used as proxies of primary productivity of marine and terrestrial ecosystems. A series of logistic and random forest regressions were used to gain insights into what is driving resilience loss in ecosystems world-wide.
Results/Conclusions
Up to 29% of global terrestrial ecosystem, and 24% marine ones, show symptoms of resilience loss. These symptoms are shown in all biomes, but Arctic tundra and boreal forest are the most affected, as well as the Indian Ocean and Eastern Pacific. Although the results are likely an underestimation, they enable the identification of risk areas as well as the potential synchrony of some transitions, helping prioritize areas for management interventions and conservation. Russia, Canada, the US, and Australia are countries with the largest areas of resilience loss identified, yet by proportion of territory, small island states top the ranking. When accounting for the diversity of ecosystems showing signs of resilience loss, megadiverse countries like Brazil, India, Mexico, Indonesia, Australia, or Colombia are on the top 10. The spatial resolution of the maps presented enable countries, regions, and even municipalities to update land use planning and take the vulnerability of their ecosystems into consideration. As new Earth observations become available, these global maps can be updated and track how ecosystems resilience is evolving, where are they recovering and where they are becoming more vulnerable. This paper showcases the first steps toward an ecological resilience observatory.
