Overall (first) results of the ‘100 questions for biodiversity conservation in Mediterranean-type regions of the world’ initiative

Abstract

Mediterranean-type ecosystems (MTEs), with their characteristic climate, occur in just five regions of the world: the Mediterranean Basin, the Cape Region of South Africa, Southwestern and South Australia, California, and central Chile. In spite of their small geographic area, they harbour a significant and exclusive proportion of the planet’s biodiversity. Biodiversity values in MTE are threatened by a range of factor including land use changes, overexploitation of natural resources, global climate changes, among others. Researchers have a key role in providing solutions for conserving biodiversity in face of these multiple stressors and socio-economic challenges.

Under the scope of the Society for Conservation Biology (SCB) – Europe Section and the International Society of Mediterranean Ecologists (ISOMED), a group of researchers from the five MTE regions of the world organized an initiative to identify the 100 priority questions that, if answered, would have a high probability of increasing the success of actions targeted at the conservation of biological diversity in the five Mediterranean regions of the world. We will present the first overall results of this exercise. A total of 1490 original questions were merged into a final 171 questions divided in 11 major topics. The three topics with higher importance were governance, climate change and habitat restoration. Further results on patterns across Mediterranean-type regions and stakeholder types, in order to identify topics of overall and regional importance, will be presented.