Evaluation of Major Threats to Forest Biosphere Reserves: A Global View

Forest ecosystems, where natural resource users are potentially in conflict with conservationists, are extremely threatened by various external factors. Resulting loss of forest cover and land-use change can have a great impact on the provision of ecosystem services (such as watershed regulation, biodiversity maintenance). However, little is known on a global scale about the character and distribution of threats to forest biosphere reserves. In view of this knowledge gap, our analysis explores the occurrence of threats and their potential causes. A global telephone survey of UNESCO biosphere reserve managers was conducted. Upon pinpointing climate change (in high-income countries) and illegal activities (in non-high-income countries) as major threats, we identified the group of forest-specific illegal activities (wildfire and its precursors) as an occurrence chiefly predominant in non-high-income countries. Our results show that forest biosphere reserves in non-high-income countries are particularly under extreme threat, as they have to address both climate change and illegal activities, while the latter are less problematic in high-income countries.