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Hot, fire-prone season with land conversion and mining expansion

A conditional statement under stated assumptions, never a prediction.

3 min read0 figures0 tables5 notesNR-SECTOR-BIODIVERSITY-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE

Contents
  1. ·Edition home
  2. ·Executive summary
  3. 1Nature is the layer under every other system
  4. 2Key findings
  5. 3Systems and sectors at baseline
  6. 4Risks and capability
  7. 5Hot, fire-prone season with land conversion and mining expansion
    1. 5.1 Assumptions
    2. 5.2 The cascade, step by step
    3. 5.3 The scenario as a table of steps
  8. 6Readings from the other desks
  9. 7The 2027 agenda
  10. 8Systems in depth
  11. AMethodology
  12. BData appendix
  13. CReferences and record
  14. ·Complete edition, for print

5.1Assumptions

Scenario SCN-GS11-HEAT-01: what is assumed, and what is held constant.

Baseline
the 2026 reference state in this edition
Drivers
a hot season with high fire risk in a biodiversity-rich region while land conversion and mining expansion continue
Analogues
2024 record tropical primary forest loss; 2023 to 2025 bleaching event1618
Interventions
none modelled: the specification describes the unmitigated case
Run state
narrative specification; quantified run scheduled for 2027

5.2The cascade, step by step

  1. 1

    CLI → BIO

    heat and dry conditions raise fire risk in forests and peatlands

    2024

  2. 2

    FOO → BIO

    fire used to clear land spreads beyond intended areas

    2024 · 2025

  3. 3

    MIN → BIO

    new mining access roads open intact areas

    mining overlap28

  4. 4

    CLI → BIO

    reef bleaching and forest dieback reduce habitat

    2023 to 2025

  5. 5

    BIO → FOO

    pollinator and pest-control losses reach crop yields

    10

  6. 6

    BIO → HLT

    smoke, zoonotic emergence risk and loss of livelihoods

    29

5.3The scenario as a table of steps

How the shock in scenario SCN-GS11-HEAT-01 would travel through Global Biodiversity and Ecosystems’s coupled systems, step by step, under the assumptions the edition states.

StepWhat happensSource
01 Climate to biodiversityHeat and dry conditions raise fire risk in forests and peatlands. Analogue or source: 2024.Edition GS-11, scenario SCN-GS11-HEAT-01, step 1
02 Food to biodiversityFire used to clear land spreads beyond intended areas. Analogue or source: 2024 · 2025.Edition GS-11, scenario SCN-GS11-HEAT-01, step 2
03 Minerals to biodiversityNew mining access roads open intact areas. Analogue or source: mining overlap [28].Edition GS-11, scenario SCN-GS11-HEAT-01, step 3
04 Climate to biodiversityReef bleaching and forest dieback reduce habitat. Analogue or source: 2023 to 2025.Edition GS-11, scenario SCN-GS11-HEAT-01, step 4
05 Biodiversity to foodPollinator and pest-control losses reach crop yields. Analogue or source: [10].Edition GS-11, scenario SCN-GS11-HEAT-01, step 5
06 Biodiversity to healthSmoke, zoonotic emergence risk and loss of livelihoods. Analogue or source: [29].Edition GS-11, scenario SCN-GS11-HEAT-01, step 6

A teaching model of a conditional scenario under the edition’s stated assumptions: not a forecast, not a prediction and not a warning. Sources: Global Biodiversity 2026, scenario SCN-GS11-HEAT-01 (2026); Global Biodiversity 2026, references (NR-CIT-1) (2026).

Notes

Numbers are the edition’s reference numbers, so a note reads the same in every chapter. The full list, with every source and its licence, is in Annex C. Annex C, references

  1. 16World Resources Institute, Tropical Rainforest Loss Drops 36% in 2025, but Fires Threaten Global Progress (release with University of Maryland GLAD Lab data), Washington, 29 April 2026. World Resources Institute, Washington. Observation year 2025. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  2. 18NOAA Coral Reef Watch, Current Global Bleaching: Status Update and Data Submission (status page). National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, College Park. Observation year 2025 (event from 1 January 2023). Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  3. 28Sonter, L.J., Dade, M.C., Watson, J.E.M. and Valenta, R.K., Renewable energy production will exacerbate mining threats to biodiversity, Nature Communications 11, 4174, 2020 (open-access abstract read). Springer Nature. Observation year 2020. Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  4. 10IPBES, Summary for Policymakers of the Assessment Report on Pollinators, Pollination and Food Production, Bonn, 2016. Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services, Bonn. Observation year 2015 (values in 2015 US dollars). Accessed 2026-11-03.back
  5. 29Allen, T. et al., Global hotspots and correlates of emerging zoonotic diseases, Nature Communications 8, 1124, 2017 (open-access abstract read). Springer Nature. Observation year 2017. Accessed 2026-11-03.back

Cite this chapter

Valadbaygi, S. (Ed.). (2026). Chapter 5: Hot, fire-prone season with land conversion and mining expansion. In Global Biodiversity Risk and Resilience Report 2026: Baseline Edition, The State of the World’s Biodiversity and Ecosystems. (Baseline Edition 2026, Report No. NR-SECTOR-BIODIVERSITY-GLOBAL-2026-BASELINE) [Draft under review]. The Global Centre for Risk and Innovation (GCRI).

Every citation form of the whole report, BibTeX and RIS included, is on the edition home. Cite this report

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The sectors behind Global Biodiversity and Ecosystems.

A reading aid: the sectors the findings run through and how strongly they depend on each other.

Select corners · hover lines6 / 15 relations

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Biodiversity and its partners

Biodiversity gives pollination and soils to food (0.6), watershed regulation to water (0.5) and zoonotic spillover and medicines to health (0.4).

W · E · I · F · H · B

Sectors
4 of 6
Relations
6 of 15
Coupling
0.46 share of total

Strongest relations in play

  • Food → Biodiversity · land conversion0.6
  • Water → Food · irrigation0.8
  • Water → Biodiversity · environmental flows0.6
  • Food → Health · nutrition0.7
Teaching values for a typical city-region, not measurements for any place. Coupling is the summed strength of the relations in play, as a share of all fifteen.
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