The predominant narrative of biodiversity loss is gradually shifting toward one of accelerated biodiversity change in the scientific literature. This work recognizes that certain genes, functional traits, species, and entire groups of animals and plants are becoming increasingly successful in novel, anthropogenic environments and expanding into new parts of the world, just as others continue to decline or disappear completely under direct and indirect human influence. These planetary changes have been increasing for millennia but vary by region, spatial scale, biodiversity metric, taxonomic group, and environmental driver considered. These past and ongoing changes mean that managing the rates and directions of transformation is often more realistic than articulating biodiversity as a wounded entity in need of restoration. Distinct policies are required to identify and substitute the drivers of biodiversity change globally (mitigation), as well as to accommodate the consequences (adaptation), to enable socially and environmentally desirable trends to outpace undesirable ones.
Thomas et al. (Tue,) studied this question.