Introduction 2 a developed world conservation paradigm 2

Conservation and agriculture in the developing world

The emphasis is also on the survival of populations with dwindling ecosystems in nature. The importance of agricultural environments to open biodiversity can be ignored by management methods that rely exclusively on border ecosystems or rural biogeography. Thanks to the rising human population, but also because of greater growth and changing consumption, global food demand is increasing. Although drought and food security can be better handled by eliminating food rights inequality (since 1981), global demand can double and surpass population growth by 2050. (Jeunnette¸2016). It is of particular significance if this can be dealt with without the mass extinction of animals, as the utilization of farmland is seen as one of the biggest threats to global biodiversity. In developing countries, where the demand to change natural ecosystems and intensify agriculture is maximum and is projected to accelerate, the bulk of the human population and economic development take place. Species already dependent on agricultural land for the destruction of natural habitats or increasingly dependent on agricultural land are especially susceptible to agricultural changes. Wild ecosystems and agricultural environments of high importance for the protection of biodiversity in developed countries need to be identified and preserved. We present evidence here that agricultural environments not only sustain a diluted subset of biota that exists in established natural ecosystems but that biodiversity is special and dependent. This justifies the wider implementation of European methods of nature conservation in developed countries and has implications for the priority of biodiversity for conservation in these areas.