The Working Group II contribution to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) provides a comprehensive assessment of the scientific literature relevant to climate change impacts, adaptation and vulnerability. The report recognizes the interactions of climate, ecosystems and biodiversity, and human societies, and integrates across the natural, ecological, social and economic sciences. It emphasizes how efforts in adaptation and in reducing greenhouse gas emissions can come together in a process called climate resilient development, which enables a liveable future for biodiversity and humankind. The IPCC is the leading body for assessing climate change science. IPCC reports are produced in comprehensive, objective and transparent ways, ensuring they reflect the full range of views in the scientific literature. Novel elements include focused topical assessments, and an atlas presenting observed climate change impacts and future risks from global to regional scales. Available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.

Climate Change 2022 – Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability

Ecosystem services assessments have the potential to support negotiating the complex trade-offs between conservation goals and other economic, political and social agendas across administrative borders, spatial and temporal scales. While earlier studies showed the global importance of tropical areas in supplying ecosystem services, the specific contribution of mountain areas has not been investigated in details. The degradation of mountain ecosystems driven by climate, demographic and economic changes is however increasingly threatening essential ecosystem services supply to people living in- and outside mountains. In this study, we present an assessment of eight ecosystem services in mountains across the world using high resolution earth observation datasets for 2000 and 2010. We link the ecosystem services supply data with an expert survey dataset to assess ecosystem services demand. We show that most mountain ranges show large patches of decreasing ecosystem services in areas characterized by high population pressure. By comparing ecosystem services supply of and demand for ecosystem services, we highlight the growing scarcity of highly demanded ecosystem services, in particular water, food and forage in mountain areas of Global South. Population growth in mountain regions and surrounding lowlands accentuate this trend and call for urgent solutions to sustainably manage ecosystems in mountain areas.

Global assessment of mountain ecosystem services using earth observation data

Climate change is altering conditions in high-elevation streams worldwide, with largely unknown effects on resident communities of aquatic insects. Here, we review the challenges of climate change for high-elevation aquatic insects and how they may respond, focusing on current gaps in knowledge. Understanding current effects and predicting future impacts will depend on progress in three areas. First, we need better descriptions of the multivariate physical challenges and interactions among challenges in high-elevation streams, which include low but rising temperatures, low oxygen supply and increasing oxygen demand, high and rising exposure to ultraviolet radiation, low ionic strength, and variable but shifting flow regimes. These factors are often studied in isolation even though they covary in nature and interact in space and time. Second, we need a better mechanistic understanding of how physical conditions in streams drive the performance of individual insects. Environment-performance links are mediated by physiology and behavior, which are poorly known in high-elevation taxa. Third, we need to define the scope and importance of potential responses across levels of biological organization. Short-term responses are defined by the tolerances of individuals, their capacities to perform adequately across a range of conditions, and behaviors used to exploit local, fine-scale variation in abiotic factors. Longer term responses to climate change, however, may include individual plasticity and evolution of populations. Whether high-elevation aquatic insects can mitigate climatic risks via these pathways is largely unknown.

Insects in high-elevation streams: Life in extreme environments imperiled by climate change.

Alpine regions are changing rapidly due to loss of snow and ice in response to ongoing climate change. While studies have documented ecological responses in alpine lakes and streams to these changes, our ability to predict such outcomes is limited. We propose that the application of fundamental rules of life can help develop necessary predictive frameworks. We focus on four key rules of life and their interactions: the temperature dependence of biotic processes from enzymes to evolution; the wavelength dependence of the effects of solar radiation on biological and ecological processes; the ramifications of the non-arbitrary elemental stoichiometry of life; and maximization of limiting resource use efficiency across scales. As the cryosphere melts and thaws, alpine lakes and streams will experience major changes in temperature regimes, absolute and relative inputs of solar radiation in ultraviolet and photosynthetically active radiation, and relative supplies of resources (e.g., carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus), leading to nonlinear and interactive effects on particular biota, as well as on community and ecosystem properties. We propose that applying these key rules of life to cryosphere-influenced ecosystems will reduce uncertainties about the impacts of global change and help develop an integrated global view of rapidly changing alpine environments. However, doing so will require intensive interdisciplinary collaboration and international cooperation. More broadly, the alpine cryosphere is an example of a system where improving our understanding of mechanistic underpinnings of living systems might transform our ability to predict and mitigate the impacts of ongoing global change across the daunting scope of diversity in Earth's biota and environments.

Key rules of life and the fading cryosphere: Impacts in alpine lakes and streams

In a period of rising concern for sustainable land management systems to achieve food security at a global scale, land-use changes demand increased attention. This study assesses the past observations and future risk calculations for land abandonment across European regions, highlighting the particular risk for mountain areas. It draws from a study commissioned by the European Parliament to investigate the situation and probability for high and very high risk of land abandonment until 2030. Revealing that land abandonment is at three times higher risk in mountain areas than in non-mountain areas, the need for action to cope with this pressure is the core result. We reveal that the high disparity in agricultural competitiveness between regions (at fine geographical scale) is the main driving force leading to the spatially uneven performance of land management. Viewing this wide set of drivers and mitigation options, land abandonment is understood as the outcome of a multitude of factors of socio-ecological systems and a combination of farm-specific, internal regional and trans-regional factors. The present dominance of narratives of effectiveness leaves little scope for mountain regions under threat of abandonment and marginalization. In this situation, policy reform would address the issue but this might turn out to be influential only if the complex nature and trade-off of the comprehensive policy framework are prioritized.

Land Abandonment in Mountain Areas of the EU: An Inevitable Side Effect of Farming Modernization and Neglected Threat to Sustainable Land Use

Mountain social‐ecological systems (MtSES) are vital to humanity, providing ecosystem services to over half the planet's human population. Despite their importance, there has been no global assessment of threats to MtSES, even as they face unprecedented challenges to their sustainability. With survey data from 57 MtSES sites worldwide, we test a conceptual model of the types and scales of stressors and ecosystem services in MtSES and explore their distinct configurations according to their primary economic orientation and land use. We find that MtSES worldwide are experiencing both gradual and abrupt climatic, economic, and governance changes, with policies made by outsiders as the most ubiquitous challenge. Mountains that support primarily subsistence‐oriented livelihoods, especially agropastoral systems, deliver abundant services but are also most at risk. Moreover, transitions from subsistence‐ to market‐oriented economies are often accompanied by increased physical connectedness, reduced diversity of cross‐scale ecosystem services, lowered importance of local knowledge, and shifting vulnerabilities to threats. Addressing the complex challenges facing MtSES and catalyzing transformations to MtSES sustainability will require cross‐scale partnerships among researchers, stakeholders, and decision makers to jointly identify desired futures and adaptation pathways, assess trade‐offs in prioritizing ecosystem services, and share best practices for sustainability. These transdisciplinary approaches will allow local stakeholders, researchers, and practitioners to jointly address 
MtSES knowledge gaps while simultaneously focusing on critical issues of poverty and food security.

https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-02408872/document

Catalyzing Transformations to Sustainability in the World's Mountains

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Catalyzing Transformations to Sustainability in the World's Mountains