Fig. 2: Our 18 investgated compensation policy options and their impacts on biodiversity. | Nature Communications

Fig. 2: Our 18 investgated compensation policy options and their impacts on biodiversity.

From: Local conditions and policy design determine whether ecological compensation can achieve No Net Loss goals

Fig. 2

a Policy design options representing two area-based approaches to achieving biodiversity gains, four options in trading biodiversity between development and compensation sites, and three methods of prioritising compensation activities to the landscape. Note: we only prioritised compensation Within PAs for Out-of-Kind trades, given that protected areas contained few opportunities for compensation (i.e. they did not contain much cleared land to restore, or experience large counterfactual losses to avert) and even more restrictive ‘In-Kind’ trades were rarely possible. Graphs b–e show negative impacts of regulated development (dashed black line, representing losses) and positive impacts of compensation policy designs (coloured bars, representing gains) on biodiversity (indicated by extent of native vegetation) across our four case study regions. No Net Loss (NNL) of biodiversity would have occurred if coloured bars met or exceeded dashed black lines. Coloured bars in b–e match the colour scheme shown in a.

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