ecological integrity

The New Zealand Department of Conservation is responsible for biodiversity management over approximately one-third of New Zealand’s land area and a network of marine protected areas; it also has a more general role in managing protected species and biodiversity advocacy. In 2004 the Department of Conservation began the development of a national natural heritage monitoring framework known as the New Zealand Biodiversity Assessment Framework, which has been operational since 2011.

Natural regeneration of new forests has significant potential to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, but how strong is the potential biodiversity co-benefit? We quantified carbon accumulation and biodiversity gain during secondary succession of two New Zealand lowland forests. The rate of carbon sequestration was the same for the kanuka–red beech succession as for the coastal broadleaved succession (c. 2.3 Mg C ha^–1 year^–1) over the first 50 years of succession.

New Zealand’s offshore islands are refuges for many threatened species, a high proportion of vertebrate diversity, and the world’s most diverse fauna of seabirds. We present key issues and questions that can be used to guide research on the conservation of biodiversity on these islands. Four global reviews formed a basis from which we identified research questions of potential relevance to the management of these islands. The research questions were assigned in the context of nine objectives proposed as a means of achieving ecological integrity.