One Earth最新文献

To address the ongoing deterioration of marine ecosystems and its consequences on livelihood, the European Union (EU) now aims to achieve 30% coverage of marine protected areas (MPAs), with 10% under strict protection per region. Here, we provide the first assessment of protection levels of EU MPAs, describing the level of legal restrictions of activities using the MPA Guide framework. While MPAs covered 11.4% of EU national waters in 2022, 0.2% were fully or highly protected. As much as 86% of MPA coverage showed low levels of protection or would not be considered compatible with conservation objectives, as they allow industrial activities. Most MPA coverage showed minimal protection across member states, sea regions, and legal types of MPAs. The EU MPA network likely provides limited ecological outcomes. Reaching the EU’s 10% strict protection target will require radical changes to the regulation of activities in EU MPAs.

The honeybee Apis mellifera is one of the main pollinators in agroecosystems, and, consequently, its colonies are exposed to agrochemicals and more fragmented and homogeneous habitats. As a social insect, this could lead to an impairment of colony health and population growth. Here, behavioral, molecular, and toxicological approaches were performed in beehives located in an agricultural setting of the Argentine pampas to compare their global state at different times of crop management. Our results show that foraging bees were impaired in their sensory and cognitive abilities and the brain’s expression of several genes related to metabolic, immune, and neuronal processes associated with social behavior after crop flowering and pesticide application. These impairments suggest potential social consequences for pollinator colonies that inhabit these disturbed environments. To our knowledge, no previous study has reported the impaired effects of agricultural intensification on insect pollinators from an integrative neurobiological perspective under realistic field conditions.

It is urgent to acknowledge the challenges of achieving sustainable coastal development in the context of blue economy expansion. Thus, blue justice emerges, emphasizing the importance of adopting inclusive approaches to guide decision-making. Small-scale fishers (SSFs) end up facing challenges in this process, such as ocean grabbing, pollution, and exclusion from debate spheres. Here, we address the knowledge gap by investigating SSFs’ perspectives and conflicts related to coastal development to inform equitable and inclusive policy formation. Our findings highlight the multiple impacts on different fishing communities, including marine traffic, blast fishing, industries, and ports, emphasizing contextual conflicts associated with different levels of coastal development. This enables the assessment of equity and justice within the domains of blue economy and blue growth. Our study showcases the pivotal role of interdisciplinary research in addressing diverse pressures from coastal development and including local communities for an effective advance in understanding blue justice issues.

Ocean acidification is a grand challenge to sustainable ocean management. Tidal wetlands are distributed from the polar to the tropical domain and provide unique ecosystem services such as groundwater carbon export. The carbonate and bicarbonate of exported dissolved carbon represent total alkalinity and buffer ocean acidification. However, the magnitude and variability of the dissolved carbon discharge from groundwater to the coastal ocean are poorly understood. Here, we estimate groundwater dissolved carbon and total alkalinity discharge by combining data from 337 locations in tidal wetlands. The average annual groundwater total alkalinity and dissolved carbon discharge in global tidal wetlands reach 16.2 (0.1–77.9) and 20.1 (0.1–96.6) Tmol, respectively, of which 83.4% is exported as dissolved inorganic carbon (DIC). Future groundwater DIC discharge decreases by 9.02%–28.91% due to increasing evapotranspiration, changing rainfall regimes, and relative sea level rise. Our study suggests that tidal wetlands export over 30% of terrestrial dissolved carbon to the coastal ocean.

Growing multiple crops in rotation can increase the sustainability of agricultural systems and reduce risks from increasingly adverse weather. However, widespread adoption of diverse rotations is limited by economic uncertainty, lack of incentives, and limited information about long-term outcomes. Here, we combined 36,000 yield observations from 20 North American long-term cropping experiments (434 site-years) to assess how greater crop diversity impacts productivity of complete rotations and their component crops under varying growing conditions. Maize and soybean output increased as the number of species and rotation length increased, while results for complete rotations varied by site depending on which crops were present. Diverse rotations reduced rotation-level output at eight sites due to the addition of lower-output crops such as small grains, illustrating trade-offs. Diverse rotations positively impacted rotation-level output under poor growing conditions, which illustrates how diverse cropping systems can reduce the risk of crop loss in a changing climate.

Global corporate-industrial meat production is associated with harms to social, animal, and planetary health. Although national policy discussions are lacking, some studies suggest addressing these harms through taxation and supply chain standards. However, these proposals overlook the potential role of corporate power in creating and perpetuating these harms. Our study addresses this gap by examining how political, economic, and structural features of food systems enable the meat industry to externalize costs of production and perpetuate ecological and social harms. Here, we analyze three case studies from different stages of global supply chains, revealing a highly concentrated meat industry, close industry-government ties, reduced regulatory oversight, and entrenched cultural norms about meat’s significance to food security. It calls for policy responses that address the economic and political power of the meat industry and the enabling of social and ecological externalities. Finally, it recommends adoption of a whole-of-food system approach to addressing unaccountable industry power.

Saline lake desiccation is widespread and typically caused by anthropogenic withdrawals for agricultural, industrial, and municipal uses, but its impact on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions is unknown. While dry-flux studies have shown that desiccating waterbodies emit carbon dioxide (CO₂) and methane (CH₄) from exposed sediments, these studies are often seasonal and for freshwater systems, limiting their application to chronically desiccating saline lakes. We measured CO₂ and CH₄ emissions (April to November, 2020) from the exposed sediments of Great Salt Lake (Utah, United States), and compared them with aquatic emissions estimates to determine the anthropogenic emissions associated with desiccation. In 2020, the lake bed emitted 4.1 million tons of CO_2eq to the atmosphere, primarily (94%) as CO₂, constituting a ∼7% increase to Utah’s anthropogenic GHG emissions. As climate change exacerbates drought in arid regions, anthropogenic desiccation and associated climate feedbacks should be considered in assessments of global GHG trajectories as well as local GHG emissions reduction efforts.

More than 25 million tons per year of phosphorus (P) fertilizer from phosphate rock is applied to meet the increasing global food and wood demand despite limited phosphate rock reserves. Yet, the fate of applied inorganic P fertilizer and its drivers have never been systematically explored globally, although doing so can help improve P fertilizer use efficiency. Here, we synthesized 987 field P-addition observations and found that, globally, on average, 12.6% of added inorganic P fertilizer was taken up by plants, 67.2% was stored in the soil and 4.4% was lost. Increased P-addition quantity was the main reason for the decline in plant P uptake. Soil pH and bulk density also modulate the flow of added P to plants, soil, and leaching/runoff loss. Our findings highlight the urgent need to improve P fertilizer use efficiency globally by lowering the P fertilization rate, especially on near-neutral soils with low bulk density.

Climate change can significantly impact agriculture, leading to food security challenges. Most previous studies have investigated the direct climate impact on crops while neglecting the impact of heat stress on agricultural labor. Here, we assess the economic consequences of climate impacts on four major crops—maize, soybean, wheat, and rice—for scenarios involving low and high greenhouse gas emissions. Our analysis is based on the output from a new generation of global climate and crop models to drive a multiregional economic model. We find that, even under a high-emission scenario, the effect of CO₂ fertilization could lead to higher yields, resulting in lower prices for major crops, except for maize. However, heat-induced losses in agricultural labor could offset the potential economic benefits of CO₂ fertilization in crop production in Asia and Africa. Our findings emphasize the importance of addressing heat-stress impacts on agricultural labor through proactive adaptation measures.

Climate change will worsen conditions for people in the Global South, while conditions in large parts of the North will improve. Migration seems an effective adaptation strategy. However, making that a win-win for migrants and receiving communities requires revision of the food system, rules for mobility, and strategies for social integration.