For this it is imperative to have tools in place that allow quantifying biodiversity impacts along value chains in a consistent way. In this session, we aim to have presentations about novel and promising approaches for how to assess biodiversity impacts along entire value chains on a global level. We encourage submissions across the terrestrial, freshwater and marine realms and we aim to have a breadth of possible biodiversity metrics and indicators included, such as indicators related to changes in species richness, functional diversity or ecosystem services.
We also call on contributions from a different range of stakeholders, from businesses to policy makers and the scientific community.
Sustainable, climate-resilient agriculture urgently depends on ecosystem services that rely on healthy ecosystems and rich biodiversity. While Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) has become a key tool for quantifying environmental impacts across production systems, including agriculture, its integration of biodiversity remains limited and often focuses primarily on negative impacts i.e. ecological footprints. In this study, we aim to advance incorporating biodiversity into agricultural LCA, introducing the complementary concept of the handprint - a measure of positive actions and outcomes that enhance or restore biodiversity along the agricultural value chain.
Integrating biodiversity into LCA typically relies on land-use or land-use-change indicators and species richness models. However, these methods often overlook spatial heterogeneity, temporal dynamics, and management practices that influence biodiversity outcomes. To address these gaps, we propose a biodiversity-inclusive LCA framework that captures both detrimental and beneficial interactions between agricultural systems and ecosystems. Resulting in better rewarding of good practices.
It comprises four key steps: defining system boundaries and functional units that explicitly consider biodiversity-relevant outcomes; compiling life-cycle inventories that include land occupation, habitat quality, and management intensity; quantifying biodiversity impacts (footprints) and improvements (handprints) through appropriate characterization factors and interpreting results to support biodiversity-sensitive decision-making. The handprint approach captures actions such as introduction and restoration of landscape elements, agroecological diversification, reduced chemical inputs and creation of ecological corridors. This allows the assessment to highlight net-positive contributions to ecosystem resilience and biodiversity. Selected agricultural systems represent different management intensities and landscape contexts. The study will compare conventional and biodiversity-enhancing practices by embedding both footprint and handprint perspectives. Agricultural LCA can evolve from a damage-minimization tool to a framework for positive biodiversity contributors. This shift supports global biodiversity targets and offers practical pathways for farmers but also next stakeholders along the value chain, impact evaluators and policymakers in accordance with planetary boundaries, rather than depleting natural capital. Additionally, contributes to reaching the ambitions aims of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity and its protocols.
How to cite: Sellis, T., Pehme, S., and Veromann, E.: Towards more meaningful biodiversity inclusion in life cycle assessment, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-164, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-164, 2026.
Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a well-established tool for assessing the environmental performance of products or services throughout their life cycle. However, when evaluating biodiversity impacts, holistic evaluations are still challenging. Shortcomings are e.g. the incomplete coverage of potential impact pathways as well as the predominant focus on the species level of biodiversity. Additionally, the reliability of LCA-results for biodiversity impact assessment is undermined by the inconsistency in modelling choices, particularly when selecting a reference state against which all potentially induced changes are compared to. Such reference states necessarily underly the majority of impact models in LCA and options range from historical baselines, natural counterfactuals or re-naturalization scenarios to limit and target references. The choice of a reference state can have a significant impact on LCA-results and, if not used consistently, compromise their significance and comparability as well as the compatibility of models. Proposals for suitable reference states and how to construct them have been given by several authors, mainly focusing on the modelling of land use related impacts. Nevertheless, there is no harmonised manner in applying them yet. Furthermore, LCA-developers often do not mention their modelling-choice explicitly, making it hard for practitioners to judge the applicability of a model and interpret its results.
The aim of this study is to unfold inconsistencies due to a heterogenous use of reference situations when assessing biodiversity impacts and thereby contribute to a higher reliability and comparability of LCA-results. Therefore, reference states that are applied in existent impact assessment models will be identified and categorized within a harmonized nomenclature. The relationship between the reference situations and the statements that can be derived from corresponding LCA-results will be assessed and the compatibility of models will be evaluated. The expected outcome of this research is a comprehensive overview of modelling options that can serve as a decision framework to support both LCA-developers and -practitioners in selecting the best suitable assessment model for their purpose.
How to cite: Adams, J., Holzapfel, P., and Finkbeiner, M.: Reference states for assessing biodiversity impacts in life cycle assessment: a decision framework, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-110, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-110, 2026.
Quantifying biodiversity impacts along global value chains requires tools that use globally consistent data, transparent methods, and comparable metrics across sites and time. Map of Life Solutions (MOL Solutions), developed with 15 years of scientific backing from the Yale Center for Biodiversity and Global Change, provides an integrated biodiversity intelligence system. This system delivers harmonized indicators and advanced assessments to support supply-chain screening, site prioritization, and alignment with emerging disclosure frameworks like the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD) and the Science Based Targets Network (SBTN).
MOL Solutions' methodologies exceed current best practices by integrating advanced biodiversity science. Its core models utilize global species distribution models, ecological traits, environmental change time series, and conservation datasets.
The system's metrics are globally standardized, underpinned by Essential Biodiversity Variables (EBVs), and include indicators formally adopted by the Global Biodiversity Framework, such as the Species Habitat Index. Other key metrics evaluate species extinction risk, ecological condition and value, and vulnerability. These metrics can be applied across various spatial scales—from an individual farm to sourcing areas spanning a country—making them adaptable to a company's level of supply chain traceability. Assessments combine these biodiversity metrics with pressure and other environmental data to rigorously evaluate potential impact.
A critical feature is the inclusion of confidence measures for all remote sensing data, which helps users determine where direct, on-site measurement is most necessary. Moreover, the system facilitates the integration of diverse locally-collected data, including eDNA, acoustic sensors, camera traps, and UAV/LiDAR. Incorporating this on-the-ground information refines species confidence and updates model outputs.
By blending global modeling with local data integration, MOL Solutions enables companies to assess a range of both negative and positive biodiversity impacts and make scientifically credible claims. The system also delivers innovative insights into ecosystem service delivery. Together, these tools enable consistent, scalable tracking of biodiversity impact and risk across geographies and value chain stages, supporting more transparent decision-making for businesses, policymakers, and conservation actors.
How to cite: Balfour, M. and Durkin, C.: Innovation in scalable global metrics for evaluating biodiversity impact and risk in complex value chains, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-926, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-926, 2026.
Quantifying biodiversity impacts along global value chains is essential for achieving the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework’s Targets 15 and 16, which call for corporate disclosure of biodiversity impacts and informed, sustainable consumption. Yet despite growing attention to terrestrial and freshwater systems, consistent methods to capture marine biodiversity impacts remain underdeveloped. Seabed damage is a top driver of marine biodiversity loss, but no globally applicable model exists for quantifying seabed damage impacts from anthropogenic systems. In our study, we develop the first global-scale characterization model for seabed biodiversity loss caused by the two main mechanisms of action - abrasion and extraction - resulting in characterization factors (CFs) at both the marine ecoregion (coastal) and FAO fishing area (open ocean) level. We focus with particular emphasis on fishing-related disturbance from trawling. Bottom trawling is a form of benthic fishing that causes abrasion to the seafloor and is the top contributor of physical disturbance to the benthos.
The model quantifies impacts by integrating disturbance intensity with regional seafloor area, and incorporating ecological recovery dynamics, substrate characteristics, and benthic recolonization potential. It improves the accuracy of previous regional models by including spatially explicit species-area relationships, activity-specific disturbance intensities, and improved recovery data. Preliminary results reveal substantial spatial variability in seabed vulnerability. Smaller or ecologically sensitive marine regions exhibit the highest impacts, reflecting limited area, unique benthic assemblages, or slower recovery rates. In contrast, large oceanic regions show lower values. By providing the first consistent, global-scale CFs for seabed damage, this work fills a critical gap in life cycle assessment (LCA) and offers a scalable framework for evaluating marine biodiversity impacts along value chains. Use of the CFs developed in our study, which will be integrated into the LC-IMPACT methodology, could support more informed decision-making in marine resource management and provide a foundation for regional applications.
How to cite: Anderson, S., Tveit, S. S., Stadler, K., and Verones, F.: Global Characterization Factors for Seabed Biodiversity Loss: A New Framework for Marine Impact Assessment , World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-404, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-404, 2026.
Understanding how global production, trade, and consumption contribute to biodiversity loss requires metrics that can be applied consistently across sectors and global value chains. Environmentally extended multi-regional input–output (EE-MRIO) models offer a way to link economic activities to environmental pressures and impacts. This, however, requires a spend-based biodiversity impact factor dataset that can be mapped to the economic and environmental flows represented in the EE-MRIO database. Here, we present the development of such a dataset, created by linking the global EE-MRIO database EXIOBASE with UNEP’s Global Guidance for Life Cycle Impact Assessment Indicators and Methods (UNEP-GLAM) framework.
EXIOBASE is one of the most detailed EE-MRIO databases and is widely used to generate spend-based Scope 1/2/3 emission factors for greenhouse gas accounting. Besides GHG flows, EXIOBASE includes stressor for multiple environmental impacts, including water/land/nutrient use and material extraction. With version 3.10, these EXIOBASE stressors have been translated into ILCD flow names, which form the basis of the UNEP-GLAM biodiversity impact assessment framework. The new EXIOBASE-ILCD satellite account can thus be characterised using the GLAM biodiversity impact assessment method. We will present the challenges and lessons learned during the linking process, including differences in classification systems, data granularity, and methodological assumptions.
The EXIOBASE–UNEP-GLAM linkage now provides spend-based ecosystem quality impact factors (IO multipliers) for all EXIOBASE sectors, accounting for total biodiversity impacts along global supply chains. We will discuss how this new dataset - together with the already available spend-based emission factors for GHG, water use, material use, and other environmental stressors - enables a comprehensive assessment of environmental footprints for the EU Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) and other sustainability reporting frameworks. Using the dataset, we will also present country-level biodiversity footprints and trends, with a particular focus on the relationship between consumption levels and biodiversity impacts. Finally, we will discuss how the new ILCD-conform satellite account of EXIOBASE also facilitates integration with other biodiversity impact assessment frameworks, such as LC-IMPACT and the EU-PEF.
How to cite: Stadler, K., Dorber, M., and Goldenberg, S.: Biodiversity Footprints and Spend-Based Impact Factors – Linking UNEP-GLAM Ecosystem Quality Factors with the EE-MRIO Database EXIOBASE, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-385, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-385, 2026.
Assessing the impacts of global value chains on biodiversity and ecosystem services is essential for achieving the targets set by the Kunming–Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. In particular, Target 15 calls on businesses to assess biodiversity-related risks and impacts, while Target 16 focuses on enabling sustainable consumption. Several biodiversity impact assessment methods exist that allow practitioners to measure impacts from a life-cycle perspective (e.g., ReCiPe or LC-Impact). However, these methods are limited because they rely on a single biodiversity metric: the potentially disappearing fraction of species (PDF). Moreover, a globally consistent impact assessment method for ecosystem services is still lacking.
Here, we present two new sets of impact factors derived from the GLOBIO model. The first set consists of intactness-based biodiversity impact factors (IBIF), and the second set consists of ecosystem services impact factors (ESIF). The IBIF dataset provides a consistent set of country-level impact factors for five environmental pressures: CO₂ emissions, NH₃ emissions, NOₓ emissions, land use (urban land, cropland, pasture, forest plantations, and mining areas), and roads. IBIF used the mean species abundance (MSA) metric and includes impact factors for vascular plants, warm-blooded vertebrates (birds and mammals), and both groups combined. MSA is a dimensionless metric between 0 and 1 where 1 denotes a species assemblage that is fully intact and 0 indicates that all species of the original assemblage are extirpated. The ESIF dataset provides a consistent set of country-level impact factors for one pressure, land use, covering four ecosystem services: pollination, pest control, soil erosion regulation, and carbon storage.
Together, these datasets enable a consistent assessment of the biodiversity and ecosystem-service impacts associated with global value chains when combined with environmental-pressure (inventory) data. They can support businesses in evaluating biodiversity impacts for emerging nature-related disclosure frameworks (e.g., TNFD, CSRD) and align with Target 15 of the GBF. In addition, they can help policymakers identify distant drivers of biodiversity loss (e.g., consumption and international trade) and take the necessary actions to mitigate them.
How to cite: Marques, A., Vezzani, L., and Schipper, A.: Deriving impact factors from the GLOBIO model to support the impact assessment of global value chains, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-238, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-238, 2026.
Consuming freshwater beyond the regional carrying capacity—the maximum volume of water that can be sustainably used by human activities—poses a critical threat to aquatic biodiversity and ecosystem integrity. Therefore, quantifying the potential impacts of such overconsumption is essential for guiding responsible and sustainable water use and for assessing the environmental impacts of global value chains. In Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), these impacts have typically been assessed through Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) frameworks, which develop spatially explicit characterization factors to quantify the potential damage to freshwater ecosystems caused by human water use. However, existing approaches generally treat water use as an undifferentiated pressure, without distinguishing between sustainable consumption and overconsumption beyond regional carrying capacity. In this study, we quantified the regional carrying capacity of freshwater consumption as the difference between available freshwater resources and the environmental water requirements needed to sustain aquatic ecosystems across approximately 11,000 watersheds worldwide, based on WaterGAP model. We then identified freshwater overconsumption by human activities and applied a global model relating freshwater fish species richness to river discharge and other covariates (elevation, basin area, and climate zone) to derive two species–discharge relationships (SDRs), distinguishing watersheds experiencing overconsumption from others. These SDRs were subsequently used to develop characterization factors measuring the effects of human freshwater consumption on freshwater fish biodiversity. Our analysis revealed higher characterization factors in watersheds where human water consumption exceeded regional carrying capacity, indicating stronger biodiversity impacts under overconsumption conditions. These findings highlight the importance of explicitly accounting for overconsumption in LCIA water-impact assessment models. Incorporating this distinction can improve the accuracy of global characterization factors and support more responsible and targeted freshwater management strategies aligned with biodiversity conservation goals. The model integrates LCIA consensus methods from the UNEP Life Cycle Initiative to enhance the assessment and make the biodiversity impacts more consistent with the midpoint impact assessment method “AWARE”.
How to cite: Mtibaa, S., Islam, K., Pierrat, E., Pfister, S., and Motoshita, M.: Assessing the potential impact of freshwater overconsumption beyond regional carrying capacity on riverine fish species richness, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-299, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-299, 2026.
Plastic debris ingestion poses an important and escalating threat to marine biodiversity. This includes both impacts from macro- and from microplastics. For macroplastics, impacts can, for example, stem from entanglement or ingestion of plastic pieces. In sustainability assessment tools, such as Life cycle assessment (LCA), attempts to include impacts from entanglement exist. However, although ingestion has been extensively documented across taxa and ocean basins, this critical impact pathway remains largely absent from Life Cycle Assessment. To contribute to closing this gap, we developed a global effect factor (EF) that quantifies the potentially affected fraction (PAF) of species impacted by macro- and micro-plastic ingestion in marine air-breathing vertebrates (seabirds, marine mammals, and sea turtles).
We compiled and harmonized population-level ingestion data from 284 peer-reviewed studies encompassing 308 species and over 55,000 individuals. Based on the known distribution ranges of individual species, exposure to floating marine plastic debris was estimated across eight major ocean basins. Species-specific dose–response relationships linking ingestion prevalence to plastic concentration were then established and used to construct a field-based Species Sensitivity Distribution (SSD). From this, we derived a hazardous concentration affecting 20 % of species above a 10 % ingestion threshold (HC20 = 51.7 kg km⁻³) and a corresponding EF of 3.87 × 10⁻³ PAF km³ kg⁻¹.
Sensitivity analyses confirmed that the EF remained consistent within the same order of magnitude under varying modeling assumptions, supporting its robustness and transferability. This EF enables the explicit inclusion of plastic ingestion impacts in Life Cycle Impact Assessment (LCIA) as a new distinct pathway of physical harm, complementing existing models for entanglement and ingestion of microplastics.
By translating empirical field data into a quantifiable biodiversity impact metric, our study provides an essential bridge between measurements, indicators, and decision-making tools. Integrating such metrics will enhance the capacity of sustainability assessments to reflect the true ecological costs of plastic pollution.
How to cite: Verones, F., Marhoon, A., Murphy, E. L., Høiberg, M. A., Borgelt, J., and Dorber, M.: Integrating plastic ingestion impacts into biodiversity metrics: a global effect factor for marine air-breathing vertebrates, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-162, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-162, 2026.
A major driver of biodiversity loss is climate change caused by greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from global production, trade, and consumption. A tool to consistently quantify GHG emission and their impact on biodiversity along entire value chains is life cycle assessment (LCA). In LCA, emissions and resource use are linked with their effects via impact pathways. Although highly relevant, many impact pathways leading from climate change to damages on biodiversity are still incomplete or entirely missing.
One critical but still missing impact pathway is sea level rise (SLR), which is driven by GHG emissions through climate change. SLR contributes to flooding of terrestrial areas, coastal erosion, and freshwater salinization. Without adaptation, the risk of habitat loss in coastal ecosystems is projected to increase tenfold by 2100, particularly endangering low-lying and erosion-prone ecosystems. These ecosystems host highly diverse and endemic species, often at risk of large-scale habitat loss, potentially resulting in severe declines in local and global biodiversity.
To quantify the impacts of SLR on biodiversity loss, we developed a globally differentiated flood model using the latest SLR projections from IPCC for five Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs). As SLR projections are driven by temperature increases, we linked them to GHG emissions through the time-integrated Absolute Global Temperature Potential (AGTP). Flood-induced habitat loss was connected to biodiversity decline through the countryside species–area relationship (c-SAR), accounting for different land cover types and land use intensities. The results are spatially differentiated at ecoregion level and expressed as the potentially disappeared fraction of species (PDF) as a metric for species richness for five terrestrial taxa.
Using the developed impact pathway, ecoregions at high risk for local species extinction and those contributing most to global species loss can be identified. Moreover, the resulting factors directly link GHG emissions to SLR-induced biodiversity loss and can thus be readily integrated into the LCA framework to better account for companies’ and products’ impacts on biodiversity.
How to cite: Teutloff, N., Dorber, M., Holzapfel, P., Finkbeiner, M., and Laurent, A.: Quantifying Biodiversity Loss: Linking Greenhouse Gas Emissions to Sea Level Rise, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-183, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-183, 2026.
Eutrophication is one of the main anthropogenic pressures experienced by marine ecosystems. It is mainly linked to the use of fertilizers in agriculture and can result in hypoxia, increased turbidity or change in pH. These effects can negatively impact marine species and affect the functioning of ecosystems. Life cycle assessment (LCA) is a tool that can be used to quantify such impacts on the environment of a given product. Part of the process of conducting an LCA is translating environmental flows associated with a product, such as nutrient emissions, to impacts through so-called characterization factors, a component of which are effect factors . While the consequences of human activity on biodiversity are most often measured using species richness, functional diversity also provides valuable insights. Different species occupy different roles in the ecosystem and provide different services, and this nuance is missed when focusing solely on the total number of species. To address this gap, we used data from the Copernicus Marine Service and species occurrence databases (GBIF and OBIS) to quantify the effects of marine eutrophication on the functional diversity of fish at the global scale. The data covers occurrences and nitrate values from 1993 to 2024 at a resolution of 0.25°. The global ocean was subdivided according to the Longhurst Provinces to create a spatially explicit model that accounts for biogeochemical differences. The functional diversity was quantified using continuous traits covering multiple trait categories and ecological functions. By pairing the nitrate concentration with fish occurrences, the maximum nitrate concentration for each species was determined. Communities were then simulated at different concentrations of nitrate to evaluate the loss of functional diversity compared to the maximum functional diversity possible in the province. The resulting relationships allowed us to calculate the effect factors which can be used in the LCA to quantify the effect of biomass production (and the resulting nitrate emissions) on marine environments.
How to cite: Blanc, J.-F., Scherer, L., and Van Bodegom, P.: Estimating the effects of marine eutrophication on fish functional diversity at the global scale, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-701, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-701, 2026.
Biodiversity loss is part of the triple planetary crises and is strongly driven by global patterns of consumption, production, and international trade. Environmentally extended multi-regional input–output (EE-MRIO) models are widely used to trace environmental pressures along global supply chains, yet most biodiversity footprint studies are limited to historical snapshots or marginal changes after shocks. Forward-looking assessments that capture long-term structural transformations in socioeconomic development, technology, and trade remain scarce.
In this study, we develop a framework for constructing prospective EE-MRIOs by systematically integrating scenario outputs from the integrated assessment model IMAGE into the global MRIO database EXIOBASE. The economic scenario information includes projections of macroeconomic development, industrial production, energy and crop system transitions, prices, and trade patterns. The environmental stressors include greenhouse gas emissions and land use, two main drivers of biodiversity loss. Prospective EE-MRIOs are generated for a business-as-usual baseline (SSP2) and three policy-oriented scenarios of reduced demand, protected areas, and climate mitigation.
As an initial application, we compare CO2 emission footprints in 2019 with projections in 2035 under SSP2. The results show that rapidly growing regions such as rest of Asia, India, and rest of Africa experience strong emissions increases due to fast economic growth combined with relatively slow decarbonization, whereas emissions decline in regions such as the USA, Western Europe, and China as a result of stronger decarbonization and slower population-driven GDP growth. This highlights a growing divergence in regional emission trajectories driven by unequal structural transformation.
Building on this baseline, the prospective EE-MRIOs enable a consistent forward-looking analysis of the responsibility allocation of biodiversity loss along global supply chains, the evolution of consumption-based drivers of biodiversity loss under different development pathways, and the assessment of synergies, trade-offs, and leakage effects under climate mitigation, conservation, and demand-side strategies. By providing a structurally consistent representation of future global supply chains, this work offers a new quantitative basis for evaluating long-term biodiversity risks and supporting long-term policy design.
How to cite: Peng, S., Daioglou, V., Stadler, K., Bruckner, M., and Pfister, S.: Identifying the leverage points for biodiversity loss mitigation in global supply chains under different future scenarios, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-464, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-464, 2026.
Biodiversity is declining at a rate unprecedented in human history and the cultivation of agricultural products is a major driver for biodiversity loss. Furthermore, in today’s globalized world, consumption and production of harmful products are often spatially segregated. Quantifying the supply chain impacts of agriculture on biodiversity is therefore critical for guiding international policy and consumers in reducing harmful practices. While past studies often used pressure factors on biodiversity as proxies for quantifying biodiversity damage, recent years have seen increasing efforts to quantify the impacts of agricultural activities on biodiversity by modelling pressure to impact relationships. However, due to limited data availability, many existing studies have been restricted to modelling impacts based on only a single pressure factor, typically land use. While this is a useful first approximation when faced with lacking data, it obscures biodiversity impacts that arise from other pressures, such as nutrient pollution. To address this gap, the work presented here provides data on nitrogen (N) and phosphorous (P) use and pollution for 162 crops in 187 regions for the period 2010-2022. To estimate emissions to the ground and to the air, we developed nutrient balances by combining and gap-filling previous global datasets on crop production, fertilizer application, soils and climate zones. Gaseous emissions were estimated according to IPCC Tier 1 methodology. The resulting dataset includes synthetic fertilizer and manure inputs, nutrient uptake and atmospheric deposition for both N and P. Additionally, for N, biological fixation and gaseous emissions in the forms N2O, NH3 and N2 as well as leaching and runoff are estimated. Emissions to the ground are estimated by subtracting nutrient outputs (except for leaching and runoff) from nutrient inputs. These may be used in concordance with the impact assessment indicators which have been developed within the Horizon Europe project BAMBOO, based on GLOBIO, GLAM and LC-Impact. Furthermore, all of the measures developed here can be used as environmental extensions for the agricultural input-output model FABIO, enabling the tracing of nutrient pollution and its impacts through global value chains at an unprecedented level of detail.
How to cite: Hinz, O.: Nitrogen and phosphorous balances for 162 crops and 187 regions in 2010-2022, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-117, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-117, 2026.
Measuring biodiversity losses and gains in infrastructure development projects is methodologically demanding, especially when such metrics are used to guide offsetting strategies that are ecologically sound, socially just, and economically feasible. This challenge stems from the inherently complex and multi-layered nature of biodiversity, which spans genetic variation, species populations, ecosystem functions, and landscape-level processes. The mitigation hierarchy provides a structured pathway to balance environmental conservation with socioeconomic development by sequentially avoiding, minimizing, remediating, and offsetting project impacts. Under this approach, No Net Loss (NNL) is achieved when biodiversity gains across all four stages exceed the environmental losses caused by the project. Integrating the mitigation hierarchy with quantitative indicators and spatial planning tools is therefore essential to assess how companies and regulatory agencies implement NNL policies and to identify existing gaps in governance, knowledge, and technical capacity.
In this study, we present a framework to quantify biodiversity losses and gains in megadiverse ecosystems such as the Amazon. Biodiversity stocks are evaluated through a Biotic Value metric defined as the product of habitat importance and the actual ecological condition of habitats affected by the project. Habitat importance is a unique score assigned to each land-cover class within the study area and reflects habitat naturalness, rarity, endangerment, and substitutability. More natural or rarer habitats—particularly those requiring long recovery times or dependent on uncommon environmental conditions—receive higher scores. Actual ecological conditions are derived from field-surveyed key ecological attributes related to vegetation structure, community composition and diversity, and ecological processes. Following guidance from the Society for Ecological Restoration, three indicators are assessed for each attribute and integrated by multivariate analysis into a robust measure of habitat condition. The resulting Biotic Value ranges from 0 for highly degraded environments, such as minelands, to 1 for well-preserved natural ecosystems. Secondary forests, depending on successional stage, can reach values around 0.43.
We apply this framework to a mining site in the southeastern Amazon and demonstrate that large-scale forest restoration can effectively mitigate mining impacts, contributing to the reconciliation of socioeconomic development with long-term biodiversity conservation.
How to cite: Gastauer, M. and Sanjuan, P.: Quantifying Biodiversity Losses and Gains to Achieve No Net Loss in the Megadiverse Tropical Ecossystems, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-191, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-191, 2026.
Global wood harvesting exerts significant pressure on biodiversity, and studies have been conducted to assess the impact of forest loss and gain or associated with deforestation embedded in the agrifood supply chain. However, the complex links between consumption patterns, supply-chain dynamics, land use and biodiversity loss remain challenging to assess as a whole. In this study, we bridge these gaps by integrating spatio-temporal data on forest management, wood flows and biodiversity impacts with global supply-chain modelling. Our analysis covers 2000–2017 and traces wood biomass from production through intermediate processing to final consumption across economic sectors.
We developed an integrated approach combining multiple models and datasets. Forestry yields and forest management intensities were derived from the Global Biosphere Management Model (GLOBIOM) and combined with biodiversity characterisation factors recommended by the latest GLAM initiative of the UNEP Life Cycle Initiative, which allow estimation of the potentially disappeared fraction of species and take into account the range area and threat level of species. Through this combination, country-specific biodiversity impact scores were calculated. To capture trade and sectoral flows, we linked these scores to a multi-regional input-output (MRIO) framework merging the REX and FORBIO databases, which provides unprecedented resolution of wood biomass flows across countries and sectors. This framework enabled us to quantify biodiversity impacts associated with global wood production and consumption, distinguishing between country contributions as producers and consumers, end-use sectors such as energy, construction and others.
Our findings reveal biodiversity impacts were concentrated in tropical regions in 2017, while China dominated global wood biomass consumption (17%). The Solomon Islands contributed 13% of global biodiversity impacts despite producing only 0.1% of wood, mostly exported. More than half of global impacts were driven by energy use, followed by construction. Since 2000, impacts have grown by 9%, driven by domestic energy demand in lower-income countries and trade of wood products from biodiversity-rich regions to high-income nations. These results underscore the need for tailored policies—promoting sustainable sourcing in high-income countries and addressing energy poverty in developing regions—while highlighting the importance of integrated modelling to inform global biodiversity conservation strategies.
How to cite: Rosa, F., Di Fulvio, F., Bruckner, M., Cabernard, L., Marques, A., Pfister, S., and Hellweg, S.: Tracing biodiversity impacts of global wood consumption and harvesting through integrated supply-chain modelling, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-653, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-653, 2026.
Global salmon aquaculture depends heavily on feed ingredients derived from wild-caught fish and agricultural crops. Both come with complex environmental impacts and trade-offs. This study investigates the regionalized environmental impact of salmon feed production for Norwegian aquaculture and which countries import impacts through consumption.
We address three questions: i) How do resource use and emissions affect biodiversity based on feed ingredient and sourcing region?; ii) How significant is the relationship between the mass and biodiversity impacts of feed ingredients?, and iii) How are biodiversity impacts distributed or attributed among consumer countries?
We combine life cycle assessment (LCA) with producer-level data, and trade flows. Preliminary results show that over half of the feed ingredients originate from Europe by mass, with Norway being the largest contributor with raw marine ingredients. South America ranks second, with Brazil leading in vegetable protein exports. Although Norway and Brazil contribute similarly in terms of mass (> 15%), their environmental impacts differ: Norway’s inputs show higher impact on marine ecotoxicity and climate change, while soy production shows higher impacts in marine eutrophication and land stress. These impact categories will be expanded to include marine ecosystem effects, such as seabed damage and ocean acidification, to provide a more comprehensive assessment.
From a consumer standpoint, the analysis incorporates both intermediate and final consumption stages to trace how environmental impacts are distributed along the supply chain. Trade data are used to link production in Norway with importing countries to capture the flow of products through processing before reaching final consumers in central Europe. Even though consumer demand and re-export patterns are challenging, including these two stages represents the main regions of demand, which is considered as a good proxy for impact allocation.
Key limitations include the lack of transparency in ingredient sourcing and incomplete inventory data. Additionally, existing inventories for LCA tend to focus on energy use and greenhouse gas emissions, often overlooking other critical impact categories. This study partially addresses these gaps by developing novel inventories, and assessment of supply chains, which contributes to a comprehensive assessment of salmon production and consumption.
How to cite: Kavak Gulbeyaz, P., Dorber, M., and Pettersen, J. B.: Mapping Biodiversity Impacts of Norwegian Salmon Feed Across Global Trade , World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-287, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-287, 2026.
Biodiversity loss has become one of the most pressing global environmental challenges1. Minimizing extinction rates is a core objective of the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework2, as a response to the global biodiversity crisis by 2050. Appropriate conservation action plans and policies to slow and reverse rates of population decline require us to understand the status of species—including their risk of extinction and especially specific threats to them.
Biodiversity threats are not only driven by local activities, but also induced from distant economic activities that require resources and services traded across habitats via global supply chains3. Gaining an accurate picture of both local and distant causing activities is a prerequisite to address threats, reduce biodiversity loss, and recover threatened species. It involves identifying where these activities occur, which threats they cause, and how they change over time.
This study maps biodiversity threats across global supply chains to both local and telecoupled human activities. Results show that international trade induces one quarter of global species under threat, equivalent to 5,908 species, with agricultural exports from Madagascar, and manufacturing, construction, and services imports to the United States and China as major contributors. Temporally, we examine changes in threat and threatened species in two periods, and show escalating threats over time, with heterogeneous impacts across taxonomic groups especially to birds and mammals. Identified contributors, hotspot sectors and areas along global supply chains that are responsible for impacts on species are consistent with previous findings, while our analysis also advances understanding by revealing temporal dynamics of biodiversity threats and supply chain-wide impacts on different taxonomic groups.
References:
1. Leclère, D. et al. Bending the curve of terrestrial biodiversity needs an integrated strategy. Nature 585, 551–556 (2020).
2. Hughes, A. C. & Grumbine, R. E. The Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework: what it does and does not do, and how to improve it. Front. Environ. Sci. 11, 1281536 (2023).
3. Lenzen, M. et al. International trade drives biodiversity threats in developing nations. Nature 486, 109–112 (2012).
How to cite: Zhang, L., Ye, Q., Huang, Q., Kharrazi, A., Wu, Y., Wu, J., and Fath, B.: Two-decade-long analysis shows rising biodiversity threats and responsibility gaps in global supply chains, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-459, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-459, 2026.
Oil crop cultivation has emerged as a major driver of global biodiversity loss through demand driven land use expansion, yet its temporally explicit, supply chain wide impacts remain poorly assessed. We quantify changes in global species loss embodied in oil crop supply chains from 1995 to 2020 from a multi dimensional perspective: we combine a 0.05° spatially explicit biodiversity impact assessment method that accounts for land use intensity (LUI) with a hybrid multiregional input output model, enhanced supply chain mapping, and structural decomposition analysis. In a first step, we reconstruct annual cultivated area and crop specific LUI and link them to state of the art global species loss factors to derive a time series of potential global species loss (PSLglo). In 2020, land use for oil crop cultivation caused a biodiversity impact of 0.015 PSLglo, equivalent to the potential long term loss of about 1.5% of assessed plant and terrestrial vertebrate species if current land use patterns persist. Tropical regions, which account for only 43% of harvested area, bear 78% of these impacts, driven mainly by oil palm, coconut and soybean production. The resulting annual time series shows that oil crops alone have generated an extinction debt that has consistently exceeded proposed planetary boundary thresholds for biosphere integrity throughout 1995–2020. Nearly half of global impacts are outsourced via trade, with increasing imports by China, the European Union and North America driving species loss in producer countries such as Indonesia and Brazil. Over 1995–2020, global biodiversity impact from oil crop cultivation increased by ~69%, with oil palm and soybean together explaining most of this growth. The structural decomposition analysis shows that ~82% of the increase in consumption based impacts is related to rising per capita consumption, which is partly offset by yield improvements but reinforced by expansion into biodiversity rich regions. Our findings underscore the urgent need for policies targeting sustainable production and at the same time consumption across global oil crop supply chains and provide a basis informing such actions.
How to cite: Wang, S., Cabernard, L., Bruckner, M., Permana Ajie, M., and pfister, S.: Global Species Loss Embodied in Oil Crop Supply Chains from 1995 to 2020 and its Drivers, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-476, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-476, 2026.
The way humans produce and consume material goods continues to be a primary driving force in biodiversity decline. Despite significant advances in quantifying biodiversity footprints, important differences exist across approaches and indicators. These include what aspects of biodiversity are measured and how they are reported. In this systematic review, we provide an overview of biodiversity impact metrics developed to assess biodiversity impacts by human production and consumption activities.
We use systematic literature mapping to scan over 1,200,000 records sourced from OpenAlex. Using natural language processing models and a cosine similarity index, we reduce our corpus to more than 7,000 records and finally include more than 150 works as part of the review.
We find that biodiversity footprinting metrics have evolved substantially since their initial development in the late 1990s. Initially focused on land use as the principal driver of biodiversity loss, metrics now also address climate change, pollution, invasive species, and, in some cases, overexploitation. We propose a classification into four families of biodiversity‐related metrics: impact assessment metrics dominate (64%), followed by pressure‐impact metrics (12%), pressure‐impact combined with impact assessment (10%), and state‐based metrics (5%), alongside a minor contribution from theoretical ecology in combination with others.
Impact assessment metrics, rooted in industrial ecology, specialise around three ecological models to characterise the effects of diverse pressures on species: (i) species–area relationships and equivalent connected areas for land use, (ii) species–discharge relationships for water flow alterations, and (iii) species sensitivity distributions for pollution impacts.
Existing metrics cover terrestrial, freshwater, and marine realms, with a predominant focus on taxonomic and functional diversity. Phylogenetic diversity remains substantially underrepresented, and while many metrics operate at the species level, relatively few extend to ecosystem assessments, and none adequately capture genetic diversity. Except for amphibians, birds, mammals, reptiles, and vascular plants, species groups such as fishes, insects, bryophytes, algae, fungi, and non‐insect invertebrates across realms remain largely underrepresented in current biodiversity metrics.
How to cite: Avila-Ortega, D. I., Søgaard Jørgensen, P., Cornell, S., Moran, D., and Engström, G.: Accounting for biodiversity impacts of consumption and production: current gaps and frontiers., World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-44, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-44, 2026.
As global efforts increasingly focus on identifying effective ways to assess and monitor forest biodiversity and ecosystem outcomes, a growing need has emerged to understand how financial allocation mechanisms and monitoring systems together influence these outcomes. This paper examines forest cover as a central outcome indicator at the intersection of two major value chains for forest finance (that is, fiscal transfers and performance audits) with Indonesia serving as the primary case study. It proposes a comprehensive framework to clarify the connections between these value chains, emphasizing how varying definitions and classifications of forests shape the selection of monitoring metrics and their broader implications for forest outcomes. To demonstrate the framework’s practical application, the paper reviews the first value chain of forest finance: Indonesia’s fiscal transfers that use forest cover as an indicator, which mobilized USD 4.8 billion between 2023 and 2024 for forested subnational jurisdictions. It then examines the second value chain of forest finance: performance audits of forest public finance in these regions, conducted according to environmental auditing standards set by the Supreme Audit Institution to reinforce accountability and transparency in financial flows. The paper further highlights areas for improvement, particularly concerning functions designated for purposes other than forests. In these cases, existing metrics in fiscal transfer and performance audit alike may be inadequate for capturing forest conservation performance. The discussion then explores how more effectively integrated value chains for forest finance can drive improved outcomes for tropical forests, directly responding to the World Biodiversity Forum (WBF)'s call for better indicators and robust impact metrics. These insights are highly relevant to emerging transformative finance schemes, such as the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) for Indonesia and other forested nations. Notably, they offer an integrated mechanism to assess both the implementation gap in forest finance and the (in)effectiveness of process-based metrics used in this domain.
How to cite: Mumbunan, S.: Forest cover, fiscal transfers, and performance audit: connecting the two value chains for forest finance in Indonesia, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-504, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-504, 2026.
Unsustainable consumption patterns, especially in high income countries, are an important driver of biodiversity loss. This loss is caused by a variety of environmental pressures, including land use, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, pollution and road use. Here we analysed the direct and indirect biodiversity impacts of Dutch final consumers using a multi-region input-output (MRIO) analysis, to examine in detail the location of impacts on biodiversity in the supply chain of products and services for Dutch final demand. Detailed insights on impacts via supply chains were obtained by performing a Production Layer Decomposition analysis, a novel approach in biodiversity footprints. As a metric for the biodiversity footprints we used the Mean Species Abundance (MSA) indicator, derived from the GLOBIO 4 model. Dutch consumption in 2015 resulted in a loss of 16 million MSA·ha·yr worldwide. Of this loss, 12% originated from consumers directly, 29% from production in the Netherlands for the final demand, and 59% from suppliers in upstream supply chains based abroad. Direct losses, due to activities of consumers themselves (households), include land use for housing, and GHG emissions from using fuels. Overall, housing and food contribute most to the Dutch biodiversity footprint. The decomposition analysis showed that housing also generates the largest loss in sectors directly producing for Dutch consumption, while the losses of goods and services lead to losses further upstream in their supply chains. The relevance of our findings is that to reduce biodiversity impacts of consumption, actors in different parts of the supply chain have to be targeted depending on the consumption category. Our study emphasises the necessity for distinct policy approaches for supply chain impacts, both national and international in scope, to reduce global biodiversity loss, whilst ensuring that any adverse impacts are not displaced to other nations. Findings are relevant in the context of EU policies of disclosure and reporting (CSRD) and due diligence for supply chain issues (CS-DDD).
How to cite: in 't Veld, D., van Oorschot, M., Marques, A., and Wilting, H.: Unravelling biodiversity impacts of consumption: a supply chain decomposition analysis for the Netherlands, World Biodiversity Forum 2026, Davos, Switzerland, 14–19 Jun 2026, WBF2026-605, https://doi.org/10.5194/wbf2026-605, 2026.
