Exploring the emergence of a tipping point for conservation with increased recognition of social considerations.

Despite a common understanding of the harmful impacts of Western conservation models that separate people from nature, widespread progress toward incorporating socioeconomic, political, cultural, and spiritual considerations in conservation practice is lacking. For some, the concept of nature-based solutions (NbS) is seen as an interdisciplinary and holistic pathway to better integrate human well-being in conservation. We examined how conservation practitioners in the United States view NbS and how social considerations are or are not incorporated in conservation adaptation projects. We interviewed 28 individuals working on 15 different such projects associated with the Wildlife Conservation Society's Climate Adaptation Fund. We completed 2 rounds of iterative coding in NVivo 12.6.1 to identify in the full text of all interview responses an a priori set of themes related to our research questions and emergent themes. Many respondents saw this moment as a tipping point for the field (one in which the perceived values of social considerations are increasing in conservation practice) (76%) and that social justice concerns and the need to overcome racist and colonial roots of Western conservation have risen to the forefront. Respondents also tentatively agreed that NbS in conservation could support social and ecological outcomes for conservation, but that it was far from guaranteed. Despite individual intention and awareness among practitioners to incorporate social considerations in conservation practice, structural barriers, including limited funding and inflexible grant structures, continue to constrain systemic change. Ultimately, systemic changes that address power and justice in policy and practice are required to leverage this moment to more fully address social considerations in conservation.

Exploración del surgimiento de un punto de inflexión para la conservación con el incremento del reconocimiento de las consideraciones sociales Resumen A pesar de que se conoce el impacto dañino de los modelos occidentales de conservación que separan a las personas de la naturaleza, aun faltan avances para la incorporación de las consideraciones socioeconómicas, políticas, culturales y espirituales dentro de la práctica de la conservación. Hay quienes consideran el concepto de soluciones basadas en la naturaleza (SbN) como una vía interdisciplinaria y holística para integrar de mejor manera el bienestar humano en la conservación. Analizamos cómo los conservacionistas de los EE. UU. perciben a las SbN y cómo se incorporan o no las consideraciones sociales en los proyectos de conservación y adaptación. Entrevistamos a 28 individuos que trabajan en 15 de estos proyectos asociados con el Fondo de Adaptación al Clima de la Wildlife Conservation Society. Completamos dos rondas de codificación iterativa en NVivo 12.6.1 para identificar a priori un conjunto de temas relacionado con nuestras preguntas y temas nacientes dentro del texto completo de las respuestas a la entrevista. Muchos de los respondientes (76%) consideraron este momento como un punto de inflexión para el campo de investigación (uno en el que están incrementando los valores percibidos de las consideraciones sociales en la práctica de la conservación) y que las cuestiones de justicia social y la necesidad de sobreponerse a las raíces racistas y colonialistas de la conservación occidental han dado un paso al frente. En principio, los respondientes también acordaron que las SbN en la conservación podrían respaldar los resultados sociales y ecológicos para la conservación, pero que no era algo cercano a ser una garantía. A pesar de la intención y conciencia individual de los conservacionistas para incorporar a las consideraciones sociales dentro de la práctica de la conservación, las barreras estructurales, incluyendo el financiamiento limitado de las estructuras poco flexibles de los subsidios, todavía restringen el cambio sistémico. Finalmente, se necesitan cambios sistémicos que aborden el poder y la justicia en las políticas y las prácticas para potenciar este momento para tratar plenamente las consideraciones sociales en la conservación.

Natural climate solutions for Canada.

Alongside the steep reductions needed in fossil fuel emissions, natural climate solutions (NCS) represent readily deployable options that can contribute to Canada's goals for emission reductions. We estimate the mitigation potential of 24 NCS related to the protection, management, and restoration of natural systems that can also deliver numerous co-benefits, such as enhanced soil productivity, clean air and water, and biodiversity conservation. NCS can provide up to 78.2 (41.0 to 115.1) Tg CO2e/year (95% CI) of mitigation annually in 2030 and 394.4 (173.2 to 612.4) Tg CO2e cumulatively between 2021 and 2030, with 34% available at ≤CAD 50/Mg CO2e. Avoided conversion of grassland, avoided peatland disturbance, cover crops, and improved forest management offer the largest mitigation opportunities. The mitigation identified here represents an important potential contribution to the Paris Agreement, such that NCS combined with existing mitigation plans could help Canada to meet or exceed its climate goals.

Social comfort zones for transformative conservation decisions in a changing climate.

Novel management interventions intended to mitigate the impacts of climate change on biodiversity are increasingly being considered by scientists and practitioners. However, resistance to more transformative interventions remains common across both specialist and lay communities and is generally assumed to be strongly entrenched. We used a decision-pathways survey of the public in Canada and the United States (n = 1490) to test two propositions relating to climate-motivated interventions for conservation: most public groups are uncomfortable with interventionist options for conserving biodiversity and given the strong values basis for preferences regarding biodiversity and natural systems more broadly, people are unlikely to change their minds. Our pathways design tested and retested levels of comfort with interventions for forest ecosystems at three different points in the survey. Comfort was reexamined given different nudges (including new information from trusted experts) and in reference to a particular species (bristlecone pine [Pinus longaeva]). In contrast with expectations of public unease, baseline levels of public comfort with climate interventions in forests was moderately high (46% comfortable) and increased further when respondents were given new information and the opportunity to change their choice after consideration of a particular species. People who were initially comfortable with interventions tended to remain so (79%), whereas 42% of those who were initially uncomfortable and 40% of those who were uncertain shifted to comfortable by the end of the survey. In short and across questions, comfort levels with interventions were high, and where discomfort or uncertainty existed, such positions did not appear to be strongly held. We argue that a new decision logic, one based on anthropogenic responsibility, is beginning to replace a default reluctance to intervene with nature.

Zonas de Comodidad Social ante las Decisiones de Conservación Transformadoras en un Clima Cambiante Resumen Los científicos y los practicantes de la conservación cada vez consideran más a las intervenciones novedosas de manejo con la intención de mitigar los impactos del cambio climático sobre la biodiversidad. Sin embargo, la resistencia a las intervenciones más transformadoras es común en especialistas y no profesionales y generalmente se asume que está fuertemente arraigada. Usamos una encuesta sobre toma de decisiones del público en Canadá y en los Estados Unidos (n = 1490) para evaluar dos propuestas relacionadas a intervenciones de conservación motivadas por el clima: la mayoría de los grupos de público están incómodos con las opciones intervencionistas para conservar la biodiversidad y dada la sólida base de valores para las preferencias con respecto a la biodiversidad y a los sistemas naturales en general, es poco probable que las personas cambien de opinión. Nuestro diseño de encuesta analizó y reanalizó los niveles de comodidad con respecto a las intervenciones para los ecosistemas boscosos en tres puntos distintos dentro del estudio. La comodidad fue reexaminada con diferentes impulsos (incluyendo información nueva proveniente de expertos confiables) y en referencia a una especie particular (Pinus longaeva). Contrario a las expectativas de malestar del público, los niveles de línea base de la comodidad del público frente a las intervenciones climáticas en los bosques fueron moderadamente altos (46% de comodidad) e incrementaron cuando a los respondientes se les proporcionó información nueva y la oportunidad de cambiar su elección después de considerar a una especie particular. Las personas que al inicio estaban cómodas con las intervenciones tendieron a permanecer así (79%), mientras que el 42% de aquellos que estuvieron incómodos inicialmente y el 40% de aquellos que estuvieron inseguros cambiaron a estar cómodos para el final del estudio. En resumen, los niveles de comodidad frente a las intervenciones fueron elevados, y cuando existieron malestar o incertidumbre, dichas posiciones no parecieron mantenerse con fuerza. Argumentamos que una lógica de decisión basada en la responsabilidad antropogénica está comenzando a reemplazar una renuencia predeterminada a intervenir en la naturaleza.

R-R-T (resistance-resilience-transformation) typology reveals differential conservation approaches across ecosystems and time.

Conservation practices during the first decade of the millennium predominantly focused on resisting changes and maintaining historical or current conditions, but ever-increasing impacts from climate change have highlighted the need for transformative action. However, little empirical evidence exists on what kinds of conservation actions aimed specifically at climate change adaptation are being implemented in practice, let alone how transformative these actions are. In response, we propose and trial a novel typology-the R-R-T scale, which improves on existing concepts of Resistance, Resilience, and Transformation-that enables the practical application of contested terms and the empirical assessment of whether and to what extent a shift toward transformative action is occurring. When applying the R-R-T scale to a case study of 104 adaptation projects funded since 2011, we find a trend towards transformation that varies across ecosystems. Our results reveal that perceptions about the acceptance of novel interventions in principle are beginning to be expressed in practice.

Response to Critique of "The Insignificance of Thresholds in Environmental Impact Assessment: An Illustrative Case Study in Canada".

Our paper, "The Insignificance of Thresholds in Environmental Impact Assessment: An Illustrative Case Study in Canada" received a critique that challenged us on a number of grounds. Namely, that we defame EIA practitioners, that we advocate EIAs to become a scientific enterprise, that we do not recognize the complexity inherent in EIA, and that EIA undergo an independent assessment by regulators. We respond to all of these points, and argue that conflict of interest is an institutional issue (not one of corrupt practitioners), and that we critique the science that forms the basis of evidence in EIA. Further, we show that the complexity and uncertainty in the critique cannot explain the findings from our paper that all cases of impact threshold exceedance were determined to be not significant in EIA. Finally, we compare the significance determinations in proponent reports to final regulator decisions and determine that they are overwhelmingly identical (93-95%). Regulators are financially independent of proponents, but their decisions on significant are heavily dependent on the information and analysis provided by the proponent reports. As regulators rely on these reports, environmental impact assessments must be based on rigorous and transparent analysis.

Public trust and knowledge in the context of emerging climate-adaptive forestry policies.

Effective governance of public forests depends, in part, on public support for changes in forest management, particularly those responding to changes in socio-ecological conditions driven by climate change. Trust in managing authorities and knowledge about forest management have proven influential in shaping public support for policy across different forest managemen contexts. However, little is known about the relationship between public trust and knowledge as it relates to policy support for emerging management strategies for climate adaptation in forests. We use the example of genomics-based assisted migration (within and outside of natural range) in British Columbia's (BC) forests to examine the relative roles of and interactions between trust in different forestry actors and knowledge of forestry in shaping public support for this new and potentially controversial management alternative. Our results, based on an online survey (n = 1953 BC residents), reveal low public trust in governments and the forest industry combined with low levels of public knowledge about forest management. We find that individuals who are more trusting of decision-makers and other important forestry actors hold higher levels of support for assisted migration. Higher levels of forestry knowledge are linked with support for assisted migration within native range, whereas no knowledge effect is observed for assisted migration outside of native range. We discuss the implications of these observations and provide recommendations to more fully engage with the challenges of low levels of trust and knowledge in this context.

Public perceptions about climate change mitigation in British Columbia's forest sector.

The role of forest management in mitigating climate change is a central concern for the Canadian province of British Columbia. The successful implementation of forest management activities to achieve climate change mitigation in British Columbia will be strongly influenced by public support or opposition. While we now have increasingly clear ideas of the management opportunities associated with forest mitigation and some insight into public support for climate change mitigation in the context of sustainable forest management, very little is known with respect to the levels and basis of public support for potential forest management strategies to mitigate climate change. This paper, by describing the results of a web-based survey, documents levels of public support for the implementation of eight forest carbon mitigation strategies in British Columbia's forest sector, and examines and quantifies the influence of the factors that shape this support. Overall, respondents ascribed a high level of importance to forest carbon mitigation and supported all of the eight proposed strategies, indicating that the British Columbia public is inclined to consider alternative practices in managing forests and wood products to mitigate climate change. That said, we found differences in levels of support for the mitigation strategies. In general, we found greater levels of support for a rehabilitation strategy (e.g. reforestation of unproductive forest land), and to a lesser extent for conservation strategies (e.g. old growth conservation, reduced harvest) over enhanced forest management strategies (e.g. improved harvesting and silvicultural techniques). We also highlighted multiple variables within the British Columbia population that appear to play a role in predicting levels of support for conservation and/or enhanced forest management strategies, including environmental values, risk perception, trust in groups of actors, prioritized objectives of forest management and socio-demographic factors.

The Insignificance of Thresholds in Environmental Impact Assessment: An Illustrative Case Study in Canada.

Environmental assessment is the process that decision-makers rely on to predict, evaluate, and prevent biophysical, social, and economic impacts of potential project developments. The determination of significance in environmental assessment is central to environmental management in many nations. We reviewed ten recent environmental impact assessments from British Columbia, Canada and systematically reviewed and scored significance determination and the approaches used by assessors, the use of thresholds in significance determination, threshold exceedances, and the outcomes. Findings of significant impacts were exceedingly rare and practitioners used a combination of significance determination approaches, most commonly relying upon reasoned argumentation. Quantitative thresholds were rarely employed, with less than 10% of the valued components evaluated using thresholds. Even where quantitative thresholds for significance were exceeded, in every case practitioners used a variety of rationales to demote negative impacts to non-significance. These reasons include combinations of scale (temporal and spatial) of impacts, an already exceeded baseline, model uncertainty and/or substituting less stringent thresholds. Governments and agencies can better protect resources by requiring clear and defensible significance determinations, by making government-defined thresholds legally enforceable and accountable, and by requiring or encouraging significance determination through inclusive and collaborative approaches.

Barriers to the development of forest carbon offsetting: Insights from British Columbia, Canada.

In recent years, the provision of economic incentives through carbon financing and carbon offsetting has been central to efforts at forest carbon mitigation. However, notwithstanding their potentially important roles in climate policy, forest carbon offsets face numerous barriers which have limited widespread implementation worldwide. This paper uses the case study of the Canadian province of British Columbia to explore the barriers associated with achieving widespread implementation of forest carbon offsets in the next several decades. Drawing on interviews with experts from government, non-governmental organizations, the private sector and First Nations, six main barriers are identified and discussed: (1) deficiencies of carbon markets, (2) limited economic benefits, (3) uncertain climate effectiveness, (4) negative public opinion, (5) limited and uncertain property rights, and (6) governance issues. While respondents from different sectors agreed on various points, divergence was also observed, notably on the trade-off between generating environmentally sound offsets and promoting cost-effective ways to achieve mitigation. We discuss these differences in the context of the goals and objectives of different actors, and offer insights for understanding the uptake (or not) of carbon offset policies.

Early cervical carcinoma and fertility-sparing treatment options: MR imaging as a tool in patient selection and a follow-up modality.

Because of the widespread use of cytologic screening programs in industrialized nations, cervical carcinoma is being diagnosed in younger patients and at an earlier stage. The traditional therapy for early-stage disease is radical hysterectomy with pelvic lymphadenectomy, which leads to infertility. In the past 20 years, fertility-sparing therapies, such as cervical conization and radical trachelectomy, have emerged and show good oncologic and obstetric outcomes. The selection criteria for vaginal radical trachelectomy include stages IA2 and IB1, a tumor that is smaller than 2 cm, distance from the internal os of at least 1 cm, limited stromal invasion, and no nodal or extracervical extension. Magnetic resonance (MR) imaging accurately depicts these criteria and is a necessary tool in the preoperative evaluation of patients with cervical carcinoma who are eligible for fertility-sparing surgery. The MR imaging report must provide the following pieces of information for adequate surgical planning: tridimensional diameters of the lesion, uterine and cervical lengths, the degree of stromal invasion, distance from the internal os, and the presence of extracervical or nodal involvement. Because patients also undergo follow-up MR imaging, radiologists must be familiar with the postoperative imaging appearance of the cervix. After trachelectomy, the uterovaginal anastomosis may appear end-to-end or with a neoposterior vaginal fornix. Vaginal wall thickening, hematomas, lymphoceles, and hematometra secondary to isthmic stenosis may be seen. The normal postoperative appearance must be differentiated from recurrent disease, which is seen as a mass with intermediate to high signal intensity in the vaginal vault or parametrium on T2-weighted images. Functional imaging, including diffusion-weighted and dynamic contrast-enhanced imaging, may help characterize recurrence.