Integral analysis of environmental and economic performance of combined agricultural intensification & bioenergy production in the Orinoquia region

Agricultural intensification is a key strategy to help meet increasing demand for food and bioenergy. It has the potential to reduce direct and indirect land use change (LUC) and associated environmental impacts while contributing to a favorable economic performance of the agriculture sector. We conduct an integral analysis of environmental and economic impacts of LUC from projected agricultural intensification and bioenergy production in the Orinoquia region in 2030. We compare three agricultural intensification scenarios (low, medium, high) and a reference scenario, which assumes a business-as-usual development of agricultural production. The results show that with current inefficient management or with only very little intensification between 26% and 93% of the existing natural vegetation areas will be converted to agricultural land to meet increasing food demand. This results in the loss of biodiversity by 53% and increased water consumption by 111%. In the medium and high scenarios, the intensification allows meeting increased food demand within current agricultural lands and even generating surplus land which can be used to produce bioenergy crops. This results in the reduction of biodiversity loss by 8-13% with medium and high levels of intensification compared to the situation in 2018. Also, a positive economic performance is observed, stemming primarily from intensification of cattle production and additional energy crop production. Despite increasing irrigation efficiency in more intensive production systems, the water demand for perennial crops and cattle production over the dry season increases significantly, thus sustainable management practices that target efficient water use are needed. Agricultural productivity improvements, particularly for cattle production, are crucial for reducing the pressure on natural areas from increasing demand for both food products and bioenergy. This implies targeted investments in the agricultural sector and integrated planning of land use. Our results showed that production intensification in the Orinoquia region is a mechanism that could reduce the pressure on natural land and its associated environmental and economic impacts.

Effects of oil palm and human presence on activity patterns of terrestrial mammals in the Colombian Llanos

The ability of animals to adjust their behaviour can influence how they respond to environmental changes and human presence. We quantified activity patterns of terrestrial mammals in oil palm plantations and native riparian forest in Colombia to determine if species exhibited behavioural changes depending on the type of habitat and the presence of humans. Despite the large sampling effort (12,403 camera-days), we were only able to examine the activity patterns of ten species in riparian forests and seven species in oil palm plantations, with four species (capybara, giant anteater, lesser anteater and common opossum) being represented by enough records (i.e. n > 20) in both oil palm and forest to allow robust comparisons. Only capybaras showed an apparent change in activity patterns between oil palm plantations and riparian forests, shifting from being crepuscular in forest to predominantly nocturnal inside oil palm plantations. Further, capybaras, giant anteaters and white-tailed deer appeared to modify their activities to avoid human presence inside oil palm plantations by increasing nocturnality (temporal overlap $$\widehat{\Delta }$$ Δ ^ ranged from 0.13 to 0.36), whereas jaguarundi had high overlap with human activities [$$\widehat{\Delta }$$ Δ ^ =0.85 (0.61–0.90)]. Species pair-wise analysis within oil palm revealed evidence for temporal segregation between species occupying the same trophic position (e.g. foxes and jaguarundi), whereas some predators and their prey (e.g. ocelots and armadillos) had high overlaps in temporal activity patterns as might be expected. Our findings shed light on the potential behavioural adaptation of mammals to anthropogenic landscapes, a feature not captured in traditional studies that focus on measures such as species richness or abundance.

Wildlife-Friendly Livestock Management Promotes Mammalian Biodiversity Recovery on a Semi-Arid Karoo Farm in South Africa

Agriculture is an essential production system used to feed the growing human population, but at the same time has become a major driver of biodiversity loss and environmental degradation. Employing production methods that restore degraded landscapes can have a positive impact on biodiversity, whilst improving food production. We assessed how mammalian biodiversity, specifically richness and their relative abundances varied on five Karoo farms in South Africa that had been amalgamated and subjected to a transition from traditional livestock grazing techniques (sporadic rotational grazing and lethal predator control) to wildlife-friendly non-lethal predator management, using human shepherding of livestock under a high-density short-duration grazing regime. We used camera trap data collected over a 4-year period, to measure mammalian species richness, distribution and relative abundance on the wildlife-friendly farm to investigate temporal changes throughout the conversion from traditional farming practices. In the last year of the study (2019) additional cameras were used to provide a spatial comparison of mammalian species on the wildlife-friendly farm to two neighboring farms, a traditional livestock farm using lethal predator controls, and a game farm. We found that mammalian species richness increased year on year resulting in a significant increase of 24% over the duration of the study. Herbivores showed an increase of 33% in the number of species detected over the years, while predator species increased by 8%. The relative abundance and distribution of most species also showed increases as the conversion process took place. For example, 73% of the herbivore species detected throughout the study increased in their relative abundance. Similarly, 67% of all species showed an increase in the number of sites occupied over the years. In the final year of the study the wildlife-friendly farm had more mammalian species compared to the game farm and traditional livestock farm, with the latter two sites having a similar number of species when compared to the commencement of the conversion of the wildlife-friendly site. These broad improvements in mammalian biodiversity demonstrate that livestock production can benefit local mammalian biodiversity through a combination of herder grazing management and wildlife-friendly farming.

Land management strategies can increase oil palm plantation use by some terrestrial mammals in Colombia

While the conservation role of remaining natural habitats in anthropogenic landscapes is clear, the degree to which agricultural matrices impose limitations to animal use is not well understood, but vital to assess species’ resilience to land use change. Using an occupancy framework, we evaluated how oil palm plantations affect the occurrence and habitat use of terrestrial mammals in the Colombian Llanos. Further, we evaluated the effect of undergrowth vegetation and proximity to forest on habitat use within plantations. Most species exhibited restricted distributions across the study area, especially in oil palm plantations. Habitat type strongly influenced habitat use of four of the 12 more widely distributed species with oil palm negatively affecting species such as capybara and naked-tailed armadillo. The remaining species showed no apparent effect of habitat type, but oil palm and forest use probabilities varied among species. Overall, generalist mesocarnivores, white-tailed deer, and giant anteater were more likely to use oil palm while the remaining species, including ocelot and lesser anteater, showed preferences for forest. Distance to nearest forest had mixed effects on species habitat use, while understory vegetation facilitated the presence of species using oil palm. Our findings suggest that allowing undergrowth vegetation inside plantations and maintaining nearby riparian corridors would increase the likelihood of terrestrial mammals’ occurrence within oil palm landscapes.

Terrestrial mammal responses to oil palm dominated landscapes in Colombia

The rapid expansion of oil palm cultivation in the Neotropics has generated great debate around possible biodiversity impacts. Colombia, for example, is the largest producer of oil palm in the Americas, but the effects of oil palm cultivation on native fauna are poorly understood. Here, we compared how richness, abundance and composition of terrestrial mammal species differ between oil palm plantations and riparian forest in the Colombian Llanos region. Further, we determined the relationships and influence of landscape and habitat level variables on those metrics. We found that species richness and composition differed significantly between riparian forest and oil palm, with site level richness inside oil palm plantations 47% lower, on average, than in riparian forest. Within plantations, mammalian species richness was strongly negatively correlated with cattle abundance, and positively correlated with the density of undergrowth vegetation. Forest structure characteristics appeared to have weak and similar effects on determining mammal species richness and composition along riparian forest strips. Composition at the landscape level was significantly influenced by cover type, percentage of remaining forest and the distance to the nearest town, whereas within oil palm sites, understory vegetation, cattle relative abundance, and canopy cover had significant effects on community composition. Species specific abundance responses varied between land cover types, with oil palm having positive effects on mesopredators, insectivores and grazers. Our findings suggest that increasing habitat complexity, avoiding cattle and retaining native riparian forest–regardless of its structure–inside oil palm-dominated landscapes would help support higher native mammal richness and abundance at both local and landscape scales.