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1 Introduction
Nowadays the scientific community is increasingly focused on biodiversity and its
development under global change conditions. Climate, land-use and biodiversity are
all negatively impacted by the human population growth and activities. Climate and
land use change negatively impact biodiversity not only directly, but also through
the combinations they produce and whose effects are not yet sufficiently known
(Scherber 2015). In addition, biodiversity is becoming increasingly important to us
in the context of coming changes, as it is a prerequisite for the adaptation to and
mitigation of the negative effects of global change.
1.1 How Biodiversity Mitigates the Impact of Global Change?
Biodiversity has some capacity to stabilize a landscape exposed to climate and land
use changes. There is a predominant view among ecological scientists that resilience is at several scales, related to some aspects of diversity, mainly through redundancies, response diversity and spatiality (Adger 2006; Folke 2006). Lavorel et al.
(2015) list vegetation structural diversity and response diversity among the main
mechanisms underpinning ecosystem services and reassembly of ecological communities, while Huyghe et al. (2012) emphasize functional diversity.
At individual levels, the effect of genetic diversity promotes the adaptability of
wild species (Reusch et al. 2005) as well as agricultural species (Wu and Wu 2013).
On the community level, species diversity is related to higher redundancy, which
brings differing impacts and responses to environmental change or perturbation
(Duffy 2002; Swift and Hannon 2010). This variety is crucial for response diversity;
it determines the resilience, adaptability and flexibility of ecosystems (Duffy 2002;
Walker and Salt 2006) and underpins the reassembly of communities (Lavorel et al.
2015). Biodiversity also decreases the risk of pathogens dispersal (Chapin 3rd et al.
2000; Hooper et al. 2005) as well as invasive species (Elton 1958 in Chapin 3rd
et al. 2000), which are expected to increase with global warming. Thus, biodiversity
loss would make the consequences of global changes more fatal.
1.2 Land Use and Land Cover Change As a Threat
to Biodiversity
Land use (LU) and land cover (LC) change is one of the most serious causes of habitat loss and consequently biodiversity decline (Sala et al. 2000; Falcucci et al. 2007).
Both theoretical and field studies suggest that many species are not able to cope
with such changes without conservation measures (e.g. Thuiller 2007). There are
various ways in which land use change affects biodiversity. The most visible is an
P. Cudlín et al.
1 Introduction
Nowadays the scientific community is increasingly focused on biodiversity and its
development under global change conditions. Climate, land-use and biodiversity are
all negatively impacted by the human population growth and activities. Climate and
land use change negatively impact biodiversity not only directly, but also through
the combinations they produce and whose effects are not yet sufficiently known
(Scherber 2015). In addition, biodiversity is becoming increasingly important to us
in the context of coming changes, as it is a prerequisite for the adaptation to and
mitigation of the negative effects of global change.
1.1 How Biodiversity Mitigates the Impact of Global Change?
Biodiversity has some capacity to stabilize a landscape exposed to climate and land
use changes. There is a predominant view among ecological scientists that resilience is at several scales, related to some aspects of diversity, mainly through redundancies, response diversity and spatiality (Adger 2006; Folke 2006). Lavorel et al.
(2015) list vegetation structural diversity and response diversity among the main
mechanisms underpinning ecosystem services and reassembly of ecological communities, while Huyghe et al. (2012) emphasize functional diversity.
At individual levels, the effect of genetic diversity promotes the adaptability of
wild species (Reusch et al. 2005) as well as agricultural species (Wu and Wu 2013).
On the community level, species diversity is related to higher redundancy, which
brings differing impacts and responses to environmental change or perturbation
(Duffy 2002; Swift and Hannon 2010). This variety is crucial for response diversity;
it determines the resilience, adaptability and flexibility of ecosystems (Duffy 2002;
Walker and Salt 2006) and underpins the reassembly of communities (Lavorel et al.
2015). Biodiversity also decreases the risk of pathogens dispersal (Chapin 3rd et al.
2000; Hooper et al. 2005) as well as invasive species (Elton 1958 in Chapin 3rd
et al. 2000), which are expected to increase with global warming. Thus, biodiversity
loss would make the consequences of global changes more fatal.
1.2 Land Use and Land Cover Change As a Threat
to Biodiversity
Land use (LU) and land cover (LC) change is one of the most serious causes of habitat loss and consequently biodiversity decline (Sala et al. 2000; Falcucci et al. 2007).
Both theoretical and field studies suggest that many species are not able to cope
with such changes without conservation measures (e.g. Thuiller 2007). There are
various ways in which land use change affects biodiversity. The most visible is an
P. Cudlín et al.