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Multiple facets of biodiversity are threatened by mining-induced land-use change in the Brazilian Amazon |
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| Authors: | Thomas J Lloyd Ubirajara Oliveira Britaldo S Soares-Filho Richard A Fuller Nathalie Butt John S Ascher João Paulo Peixoto Pena Barbosa João Aguiar Nogueira Batista Antonio D Brescovit Claudio J B de Carvalho Paulo De Marco Viviane Gianluppi Ferro Felipe Sá Fortes Leite Peter Löwenberg-Neto Adriano Pereira Paglia Daniella Teixeira de Rezende Adalberto J Santos Daniel Paiva Silva Marcelo Ferreira de Vasconcelos Laura J Sonter |
| Institution: | 1. School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia;2. Centro de Sensoriamento Remoto, Instituto de Geociências, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil;3. Centre for Biodiversity & Conservation Science, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia
School of Biological Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia;4. School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia Centre for Biodiversity & Conservation Science, The University of Queensland, St Lucia, Queensland, Australia;5. Department of Biological Sciences, National University of Singapore, Singapore, Singapore;6. Laboratório Especial de Coleções Zoológicas, Instituto Butantan, São Paulo, Brazil;7. Departamento de Botânica, Instituto de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil;8. Departamento de Zoologia, Universidade Federal do Paraná, Curitiba, Brazil;9. Departamento de Ecologia, Instituto de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Federal de Goiás, Goiania, Brazil;10. Laboratório Sagarana, Instituto de Ciências Biológicas e da Saúde, Universidade Federal de Viçosa, Florestal, Brazil;11. Universidade Federal da Integração Latino-Americana, Foz do Iguaçu, Brazil;12. Departamento de Biologia Geral, Instituto de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil;13. Sección Paleontología de Vertebrados, Museo Argentino de Ciencias Naturales Bernardino Rivadavia, Buenos Aires, Argentina;14. Departamento de Zoologia, Instituto de Ciências Biológicas, Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil;15. Conservation Biogeography and Macroecology Lab, Departamento de Ciências Biológicas, Instituto Federal Goiano, Urutaí, Brazil;16. Museu de Ciências Naturais, Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Minas Gerais, Belo Horizonte, Brazil |
| Abstract: | AimMining is increasingly pressuring areas of critical importance for biodiversity conservation, such as the Brazilian Amazon. Biodiversity data are limited in the tropics, restricting the scope for risks to be appropriately estimated before mineral licensing decisions are made. As the distributions and range sizes of other taxa differ markedly from those of vertebrates—the common proxy for analysis of risk to biodiversity from mining—whether mining threatens lesser-studied taxonomic groups differentially at a regional scale is unclear.LocationBrazilian Amazon.MethodsWe assess risks to several facets of biodiversity from industrial mining by comparing mining areas (within 70 km of an active mining lease) and areas unaffected by mining, employing species richness, species endemism, phylogenetic diversity and phylogenetic endemism metrics calculated for angiosperms, arthropods and vertebrates.ResultsMining areas contained higher densities of species occurrence records than the unaffected landscape, and we accounted for this sampling bias in our analyses. None of the four biodiversity metrics differed between mining and nonmining areas for vertebrates. For arthropods, species endemism was greater in mined areas. Mined areas also had greater angiosperm species richness, phylogenetic diversity and phylogenetic endemism, although less species endemism than unmined areas.Main ConclusionsUnlike for vertebrates, facets of angiosperm and arthropod diversity are relatively higher in areas of mining activity, underscoring the need to consider multiple taxonomic groups and biodiversity facets when assessing risk and evaluating management options for mining threats. Particularly concerning is the proximity of mining to areas supporting deep evolutionary history, which may be impossible to recover or replace. As pressures to expand mining in the Amazon grow, impact assessments with broader taxonomic reach and metric focus will be vital to conserving biodiversity in mining regions. |
| Keywords: | Endemism evolutionary potential extractive industries habitat loss indirect impacts mineral resource governance phylogenetic diversity phylogeography species richness |