TY - JOUR
T1 - How will oil palm expansion affect biodiversity?
AU - Fitzherbert, Emily B.
AU - Struebig, Matthew J.
AU - Morel, Alexandra
AU - Danielsen, Finn
AU - Brühl, Carsten A.
AU - Donald, Paul F.
AU - Phalan, Ben
PY - 2008/10/1
Y1 - 2008/10/1
N2 - Oil palm is one of the world's most rapidly increasing crops. We assess its contribution to tropical deforestation and review its biodiversity value. Oil palm has replaced large areas of forest in Southeast Asia, but land-cover change statistics alone do not allow an assessment of where it has driven forest clearance and where it has simply followed it. Oil palm plantations support much fewer species than do forests and often also fewer than other tree crops. Further negative impacts include habitat fragmentation and pollution, including greenhouse gas emissions. With rising demand for vegetable oils and biofuels, and strong overlap between areas suitable for oil palm and those of most importance for biodiversity, substantial biodiversity losses will only be averted if future oil palm expansion is managed to avoid deforestation.
AB - Oil palm is one of the world's most rapidly increasing crops. We assess its contribution to tropical deforestation and review its biodiversity value. Oil palm has replaced large areas of forest in Southeast Asia, but land-cover change statistics alone do not allow an assessment of where it has driven forest clearance and where it has simply followed it. Oil palm plantations support much fewer species than do forests and often also fewer than other tree crops. Further negative impacts include habitat fragmentation and pollution, including greenhouse gas emissions. With rising demand for vegetable oils and biofuels, and strong overlap between areas suitable for oil palm and those of most importance for biodiversity, substantial biodiversity losses will only be averted if future oil palm expansion is managed to avoid deforestation.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=51649105840&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.tree.2008.06.012
DO - 10.1016/j.tree.2008.06.012
M3 - Review article
C2 - 18775582
AN - SCOPUS:51649105840
SN - 0169-5347
VL - 23
SP - 538
EP - 545
JO - Trends in Ecology and Evolution
JF - Trends in Ecology and Evolution
IS - 10
ER -