The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI)
Biodiversity science studies the variety of life at the level of genes, species and ecosystems, and the processes that variety sustains. As a risk field it asks a sharper question: how much loss can a system absorb before the services people rely on fail, and who bears the consequences? This overview sets out why the field matters, what experts study and how it connects to the other fields of Biodiversity Nexus.
The Biodiversity Nexus field covers ecosystem integrity, biodiversity loss and nature-related risks to human and economic systems. Experts in it study questions such as ecosystem integrity and species and genetic diversity, with methods such as ecology and biodiversity science as well as Earth observation and remote sensing. Its counterparts at GRF and GRA look at the same systems through governance and finance.
Fig.How GCRI, GRF and GRA share one field while the authorities decide. Design, not a record.
The working screen behind this subject: its structure, terms and states. Names are placeholders and values illustrative.
Agriculture depends on soil organisms, pollinators and pest predators. Cities depend on upstream forests and wetlands for clean, regulated water. Coastal settlements depend on reefs, dunes, salt marshes and mangroves to break waves and hold sediment. Fisheries depend on breeding grounds that are often far from where fish are caught. Many medicines, materials and cultural practices depend on particular species and places.
These dependencies are distributed unevenly. Rural households, Indigenous peoples and coastal communities often depend most directly on local ecosystems and have the fewest substitutes when they degrade. The same loss can therefore be a marginal cost in one place and a threat to livelihoods in another, which is why the field treats distribution as part of the science rather than an afterthought.
The extent and condition of ecosystems and the abundance and diversity of species, measured through field surveys, monitoring networks and remote sensing. See Ecosystem integrity and Species and genetic diversity.
Land and sea use change, exploitation, climate change, pollution and invasive species, and how they interact in particular places.
The points at which systems shift state, and the properties, such as connectivity and functional redundancy, that help them recover. See Forests and landscapes and Wetlands and freshwater.
Which functions people and economies rely on, and how losses travel. See Ecosystem services and Coastal and marine biodiversity.
Whether conservation and restoration work, measured against what would have happened without them. See Restoration and nature-based solutions.
Each term as this page uses it. Where a standard-setting body defines the term, the wording follows that body.
| Term | Definition |
|---|---|
| Nature-related risk | Risk to an organisation or economy arising from its dependencies and impacts on nature, as the TNFD recommendations frame it. |
| Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework | The framework adopted under the CBD with goals for 2050 and targets for 2030 to halt and reverse biodiversity loss. |
| Direct drivers of biodiversity loss | Land and sea use change, direct exploitation of organisms, climate change, pollution and invasive alien species, the five drivers IPBES identifies. |
| Systemic risk | Risk arising from the interactions and dependencies within and between systems, where a shock can propagate and threaten the functioning of the whole. |
Biodiversity loss is both a consequence of other risks and a cause of them. Climate change shifts species ranges and stresses ecosystems, while degraded ecosystems store less carbon and buffer fewer hazards. Water security, food systems and coastal safety all run through ecological processes. Dependencies and consequences maps these links in detail.
The current service level is R0: information and enquiries. An enquiry receives a reference and names the next step; applications, payments, compute allocations and registrations open only when their team, terms and review capacity exist.