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What changing energy flows reveal about Africa’s ecosystems

As the giants of the animal kingdom dwindle in numbers, a new way to assess ecosystem function sheds light on animals’ changing ecological contributions.
By
  1. Wendy Foden

    1. Wendy Foden is in the Scientific Services unit at South African National Parks, Cape Town 7950, South Africa; at the School of Climate Studies, University of Stellenbosch, Stellenbosch, South Africa; and in the International Union for Conservation of Nature Species Survival Commission’s Climate Change Specialist Group, Gland, Switzerland.

Animals are more than just inhabitants of landscapes. They are engines that cycle carbon, distribute nutrients and drive the ecosystem functions (such as pollination) that support life on Earth. Plants generate fuel by converting sunlight into chemical energy through the process of photosynthesis. This organic material is consumed by animals and finally reaches bacteria and fungi known as decomposers, which break down dead plant and animal matter and recycle their nutrients to the environment. But what happens to ecosystems when, as in sub-Saharan Africa, the numbers of large animals fall? Writing in Nature, Loft et al.1 present an approach that converts data about animal-species composition into a common currency: energy flow.

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Nature 649, 35-37 (2026)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-025-03215-0

References

  1. Loft, T. et al. Nature 649, 104–112 (2026).

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  2. Scholes, R. J. & Biggs, R. Nature 434, 45–49 (2005).

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  3. Parmesan, C. et al. in Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability. Contribution of Working Group II to the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (eds Pörtner, H.-O. et al.) Ch. 2 (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2023).

  4. Owen-Smith, R. N. Megaherbivores: The Influence of Very Large Body Size on Ecology (Cambridge Univ. Press, 1988).

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Competing Interests

The author declares no competing interests.

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