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Tropical and subtropical dry woodlands are rich in biodiversity and carbon. Yet, many of these woodlands are under high deforestation pressure and remain weakly protected. Here, we assessed how deforestation dynamics relate to areas of woodland protection and to conservation priorities across the world's tropical dry woodlands. Specifically, we characterized different types of deforestation frontier from 2000 to 2020 and compared them to protected areas (PAs), Indigenous Peoples' lands and conservation areas for biodiversity, carbon and water. We found that global conservation priorities were always overrepresented in tropical dry woodlands compared to the rest of the globe (between 4% and 96% more than expected, depending on the type of conservation priority). Moreover, about 41% of all dry woodlands were characterized as deforestation frontiers, and these frontiers have been falling disproportionately in areas with important regional (i.e. tropical dry woodland) conservation assets. While deforestation frontiers were identified within all tropical dry woodland classes of woodland protection, they were lower than the average within protected areas coinciding with Indigenous Peoples' lands (23%), and within other PAs (28%). However, within PAs, deforestation frontiers have also been disproportionately affecting regional conservation assets. Many emerging deforestation frontiers were identified outside but close to PAs, highlighting a growing threat that the conserved areas of dry woodland will become isolated. Understanding how deforestation frontiers coincide with major types of current woodland protection can help target context-specific conservation policies and interventions to tropical dry woodland conservation assets (e.g. PAs in which deforestation is rampant require stronger enforcement, inactive deforestation frontiers could benefit from restoration). Our analyses also identify recurring patterns that can be used to test the transferability of governance ap, Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100001871, H2020 European Research Council http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100010663, International Climate and Forest Initiative, Ministerio de Ciencia e Innovación http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100004837, Peer Reviewed

Land-use frontiers, such as agriculture expanding into forests, remain a major driver of biodiversity loss, and often lead to conservation responses. To better understand the geographies of conservation, connecting conservation with tools used widely in Land System Science – particularly the frontier concept – allows assessing the patterns, actors, and drivers of conservation. We propose that land conservation can be analysed through three different perspectives. First, conservation can be framed as efforts to slow or stop other frontiers. Second, the expansion of conservation could itself be described as a frontier process, similarly leading to institutional and cultural reorganization, and sometimes conflicts (e.g. green grabbing). Third, frontiers can be seen as spaces where multiple land uses, including conservation, interact. Analysing conservation through these perspectives could be particularly powerful to thoroughly consider the social-ecological contexts in which conservation happens, and thus to bridge the disciplines of Land System Science and Conservation Science.

Archetype analysis is a promising approach in sustainability science to identify patterns and explain mechanisms shaping the sustainability of social-ecological systems. Although considerable efforts have been devoted to developing quality standards and methodological advances for archetype analysis, archetype validation remains a major challenge. Drawing on the insights from two international workshops on archetype analysis and on broader literature on validity, we propose a framework that identifies and describes six dimensions of validity: conceptual; construct; internal; external; empirical; and application validity. We first discuss the six dimensions in relation to different methodological approaches and purposes of archetype analysis. We then present an operational use of the framework for researchers to assess the validity of archetype analysis and to support sound archetype identification and policy-relevant applications. Finally, we apply our assessment to 18 published archetype analyses, which we use to describe the challenges and insights in validating the different dimensions and suggest ways to holistically improve the validity of identified archetypes. With this, we contribute to more rigorous archetype analyses, helping to develop the potential of the approach for guiding sustainability solutions.

Tropical dry woodlands are rapidly being lost to agricultural expansion, but how deforestation dynamics play out in these woodlands remains poorly understood. We have developed an approach to detect and map high-level patterns of deforestation frontiers, that is, the expansion of woodland loss across continents in unprecedented spatio-temporal detail. Deforestation in tropical dry woodlands is pervasive, with over 71 Mha lost since 2000 and one-third of wooded areas located in deforestation frontiers. Over 24.3 Mha of deforestation frontiers fall into what we term ‘rampant frontiers’. These are characterized by drastic woodland loss and conditions favourable for capital-intensive agriculture, as seen in the South American Chaco and Southeast Asia. We have found many active and emerging frontiers (~59% of all frontiers), mostly in the understudied dry woodlands of Africa and Asia, where greater frontier monitoring is needed. Our approach enables consistent, repeatable frontier monitoring, and our global frontier typology fosters comparative research and context-specific policymaking.

This article was supported by the Open Access Publication Fund of Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin., Land-use frontiers, such as agriculture expanding into forests, remain a major driver of biodiversity loss, and often lead to conservation responses. To better understand the geographies of conservation, connecting conservation with tools used widely in Land System Science – particularly the frontier concept – allows assessing the patterns, actors, and drivers of conservation. We propose that land conservation can be analysed through three different perspectives. First, conservation can be framed as efforts to slow or stop other frontiers. Second, the expansion of conservation could itself be described as a frontier process, similarly leading to institutional and cultural reorganization, and sometimes conflicts (e.g. green grabbing). Third, frontiers can be seen as spaces where multiple land uses, including conservation, interact. Analysing conservation through these perspectives could be particularly powerful to thoroughly consider the social-ecological contexts in which conservation happens, and thus to bridge the disciplines of Land System Science and Conservation Science., Peer Reviewed

Hunting and its impacts on wildlife are typically studied regionally, with a particular focus on the Global South. Hunting can, however, also undermine rewilding efforts or threaten wildlife in the Global North. Little is known about how hunting manifests under varying socioeconomic and ecological contexts across the Global South and North. Herein, we examined differences and commonalities in hunting characteristics across an exemplary Global South-North gradient approximated by the Human Development Index (HDI) using face-to-face interviews with 114 protected area (PA) managers in 25 African and European countries. Generally, we observed that hunting ranges from the illegal, economically motivated, and unsustainable hunting of herbivores in the South to the legal, socially and ecologically motivated hunting of ungulates within parks and the illegal hunting of mainly predators outside parks in the North. Commonalities across this Africa-Europe South-North gradient included increased conflict-related killings in human-dominated landscapes and decreased illegal hunting with beneficial community conditions, such as mutual trust resulting from community involvement in PA management. Nevertheless, local conditions cannot outweigh the strong effect of the HDI on unsustainable hunting. Our findings highlight regional challenges that require collaborative, integrative efforts in wildlife conservation across actors, while identified commonalities may outline universal mechanisms for achieving this goal.

Alien plant species have been essential for farming and agro-forestry systems and for their supply of food, fiber, tannins, resins or wood from antiquity to the present. They also contributed to supporting functions and regulating services (water, soil, biodiversity) and to the design of landscapes with high cultural and scenic value. Some of those species were intentionally introduced, others arrived accidentally, and a small proportion escaped, naturalized and became invasive in natural ecosystems—these are known as invasive alien species (IAS). Here, invasive means that these species have some significant negative impact, either by spreading from human-controlled environments (e.g. fields, gardens) to natural ecosystems, where they can cause problems to native species, or to other production systems or urban areas, impacting on agricultural, forestry activities or human health. Socio-environmental impacts associated with plant invasions have been increasingly recognized worldwide and are expected to increase considerably under changing climate or land use. Early detection tools are key to anticipate IAS and to prevent and control their impacts. In this chapter, we focus on crop and non-crop alien plant species for which there is evidence or prediction of invasive behaviour and impacts. We provide insights on their history, patterns, risks, early detection, forecasting and management under climate change. Specifically, we start by providing a general overview on the history of alien plant species in agricultural and agroforestry systems worldwide (Sect. 1). Then, we assess patterns, risks and impacts resulting from alien plants originally cultivated and that became invasive outside cultivation areas (Sect. 2). Afterwards, we provide several considerations for managing the spread of invasive plant species in the landscape (Sect. 3). Finally, we discuss challenges of alien plant invasions for agricultural and agroforest systems, in the light of climate change (Sect.

Capsule: One of the southernmost populations of the Black Guillemot Cepphus grylle is currently endangered, and the risk may be exacerbated by climate change. Aims: We evaluated the future vulnerability of the Black Guillemot by predicting the impact of climate change on the geographic distribution of its breeding and foraging range in the Baltic Sea. Methods: We used MaxEnt, a species distribution modelling technique, to predict the current and future breeding grounds and foraging sites. Results: We found that although the foraging range is expected to increase in the southern Baltic Sea in future, these areas will no longer be suitable as breeding grounds due to a changing climate, creating a spatial mismatch. Conclusion: Our predictions indicate where threats to the species may be most severe and can be used to guide conservation planning. We advocate conservation measures which integrate potential future threats and focus on breeding sites across the current and future potential geographic range of the Black Guillemot.