Preface

1It gives me great pleasure to provide the preface to this work, which shines a spotlight on some of the research projects and outcomes which best illustrate IRD’s commitment to biodiversity and sustainable development. At this crucial time, caught between the disappointing results of the Aichi Targets and the hope for a new post-2020 agenda for biodiversity, it seems more urgent than ever to demonstrate how research can help us rise to the global challenge of protecting biodiversity.

2As we know, sustainable development and the science of sustainability are relatively recent inventions: the former was formally defined in the early 1990s in the wake of the Rio Conference, while the second has risen to prominence only over the past decade. IRD is certainly a more long-standing scientific institution, but the structure of our research operations has long promoted original science and nurtured the emergence of projects focusing on the priorities of understanding and protecting biodiversity and ensuring sustainability in our current ways of life.

3This unique position can be largely explained by IRD’s long-standing engagement with our partners in the Global South. For over seventy-five years, the research conducted at IRD has prioritised a long-term approach in the field, conducive to close collaboration with our partners. This commitment has become even stronger in recent years, with the systematic pursuit of fair, sustainable partnerships which have a real, positive impact on societal sustainability and environmental efforts in the Global South, as well as catalysing the development of research capacities in these parts of the world.

4The second major factor is the multidisciplinary nature of the research conducted at IRD. Rising to the challenges of “development” has inspired the Institute to develop and adopt a scientific approach whereby different disciplines combine and interact in order to better respond to the human, social and ecological issues affecting countries in the Global South. Of course, IRD, like the majority of the world’s research organisations, was long influenced by an approach to development which we now know could occasionally yield negative consequences for natural milieus and environmental dynamics. And yet, the resolutely multidisciplinary philosophy of IRD also fosters the emergence of more integrated approaches which are better attuned to the interactions between humans and non-humans.

5Of all the great contemporary environmental challenges, protecting biodiversity is probably one of the most complex issues we face, due to the combination of global trends and specific, local contexts. This complexity is amplified further when we consider that the biodiversity which we seek to protect cannot be understood independently of its interactions with the human societies who live with it, use it, manage it, promote it, protect it and, occasionally, destroy it. Precisely because of this complexity, we urgently need to adopt research processes which are user-focused and co-constructed, drawing upon knowledge taken from a broad variety of scientific, societal and traditional systems of learning.

6IRD is committed to working alongside organisation which, like the UICN, have been fighting to protect biodiversity for more than seventy years, as well as younger institutions such as the IPBES and the FRB, whose contribution to promoting biodiversity and establishing the issue as a pressing societal priority is undeniable, as well as the great array of stakeholders – researchers, practitioners, decision-makers and local people – who contribute to the extraordinary vitality of the research being done in the Global South. IRD remains fully committed to a vision of scientific endeavour which yields tangible, utilisable knowledge for the Global South, sustainability science in the strongest sense of the term, protecting our planet and its biodiversity, so that they can thrive in the long term for humanity.

7This volume represents a significant milestone in our pursuit of this shared goal of sustainability, offering a condensed summary of some of the most impactful research conducted by researchers at IRD and our partners, all in the name of better understanding and protecting biodiversity. This is not a matter to be consigned to the realm of international affairs: it is our responsibility to co-construct a new approach to biodiversity, taking into consideration the potential for conflict and synergy with other sustainable development goals, and the limits imposed by the viability of Earth’s natural systems.