Florian Hartig

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Offsetting Policies for Biodiversity Conservation: The Need for Compensating Habitat Relocation

Karin Johst, Florian Hartig & Martin Drechsler

Models of the Ecological Hierarchy - From Molecules to the Ecosphere, 413–430 (2012)
Cite this
@incollection{johst2012offsetting,
  author = {Karin Johst and Florian Hartig and Martin Drechsler},
  title = {Offsetting Policies for Biodiversity Conservation: The Need for Compensating Habitat Relocation},
  booktitle = {Models of the Ecological Hierarchy - From Molecules to the Ecosphere},
  publisher = {Elsevier},
  pages = {413--430},
  year = {2012},
  doi = {10.1016/B978-0-444-59396-2.00024-9},
}

DOI: 10.1016/B978-0-444-59396-2.00024-9
Citation statistics: 6 (Google Scholar) · 3 (OpenAlex), as of 29 October 2026

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Abstract

To halt biodiversity loss, market-based conservation policies known as biodiversity offsetting are increasingly implemented in developed countries. These policies allow the destruction of natural habitats if new habitat of equal quality has been created elsewhere. Yet, even at constant total habitat area, patch relocations can be detrimental for species. Using an analytical formula for metapopulation viability, we provide understanding and novel insights into the interplay between the landscape attributes patch number, connectivity, and level of patch turnover. We show that both landscape and species characteristics must be considered to ensure that biodiversity offsetting is effective and derive guidelines for the design of such policies.

What the paper shows and why it matters

(AI-generated)

Biodiversity offsetting is a market-based conservation policy that, according to the chapter, is increasingly implemented in developed countries to halt biodiversity loss. It allows natural habitat to be destroyed if new habitat of equal quality has been created elsewhere. The problem the chapter takes on is whether moving habitat patches is harmless for species when the total habitat area stays the same.

The chapter argues that offsetting can harm species even when total habitat area is kept constant, and examines how the number of patches, their connectivity and the level of patch turnover (how often patches are lost and replaced) interact in this. It uses an analytical formula for metapopulation viability, a measure of the prospects for persistence of a set of linked local populations.

The chapter presents its results as showing that effective offsetting has to take both landscape and species characteristics into account, and derives guidelines for the design of offsetting policies.

Book chapter, edited by F. Jordán and S. E. Jørgensen.