Current protected areas provide limited benefits for European river biodiversity
The result's identifiers
Result code in IS VaVaI
<a href="https://www.isvavai.cz/riv?ss=detail&h=RIV%2F00216224%3A14310%2F25%3A00144629" target="_blank" >RIV/00216224:14310/25:00144629 - isvavai.cz</a>
Result on the web
<a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-67125-5" target="_blank" >https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-67125-5</a>
DOI - Digital Object Identifier
<a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41467-025-67125-5" target="_blank" >10.1038/s41467-025-67125-5</a>
Alternative languages
Result language
angličtina
Original language name
Current protected areas provide limited benefits for European river biodiversity
Original language description
Protected areas are a principal conservation tool for addressing biodiversity loss. Such protection is especially needed in freshwaters, given their greater biodiversity losses compared to terrestrial and marine ecosystems. However, broad-scale evaluations of protected area effectiveness for freshwater biodiversity are lacking. Here, we provide a continental-scale analysis of the relationship between protected areas and freshwater biodiversity using 1,754 river invertebrate community time series sampled between 1986 and 2022 across ten European countries. Protected areas primarily benefited poor-quality communities (indicative of higher human impacts) that were protected, or that gained protection, across a substantial proportion of their upstream catchment. Protection had little to no influence on moderate- and high-quality communities, although high-quality communities potentially provide less scope for effect. Our results reveal the overall limited effectiveness of current protected areas for freshwater biodiversity, likely because they are typically designed and managed to achieve terrestrial conservation goals. Broadly improving effectiveness for freshwater biodiversity requires catchment-scale management approaches involving larger and more continuous upstream protection, and efforts to address remaining stressors. These approaches would also benefit connected terrestrial and coastal ecosystems, thus generally helping bend the curve of global biodiversity loss.
Czech name
—
Czech description
—
Classification
Type
J<sub>imp</sub> - Article in a specialist periodical, which is included in the Web of Science database
CEP classification
—
OECD FORD branch
10600 - Biological sciences
Result continuities
Project
<a href="/en/project/GA23-05268S" target="_blank" >GA23-05268S: Linking climate warming to increasing invertebrate species richness in running waters: from historical data to experiments</a><br>
Continuities
P - Projekt vyzkumu a vyvoje financovany z verejnych zdroju (s odkazem do CEP)
Others
Publication year
2025
Confidentiality
S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů
Data specific for result type
Name of the periodical
Nature Communications
ISSN
2041-1723
e-ISSN
2041-1723
Volume of the periodical
16
Issue of the periodical within the volume
1
Country of publishing house
DE - GERMANY
Number of pages
11
Pages from-to
1-11
UT code for WoS article
001642086800004
EID of the result in the Scopus database
2-s2.0-105025171419