Péter Batáry, Róbert Gallé, Dávid Korányi, Tamás Lakatos, Balázs Deák, Nikolett Gallé-Szpisjak, Melinda Kabai, Csaba Koszta, Dorota Kotowska, Riho Marja, Brigitta Palotás, Borbála Szabó, Attila Torma, András Báldi, Erzsébet Hornung, Zoltán László, Zsolt Molnár, Jenő J. Purger, Gábor Seress, István Urák, Dragica Purger, Krisztina Sándor, László Somay, Gabriella Süle, Orsolya Valkó, Andreea Rebeka Zsigmond, Christina Fischer, Lorenzo Marini, Teja Tscharntke, Katalin Szitár, Edina Török
{"title":"Biodiversity and human well-being trade-offs and synergies in villages","authors":"Péter Batáry, Róbert Gallé, Dávid Korányi, Tamás Lakatos, Balázs Deák, Nikolett Gallé-Szpisjak, Melinda Kabai, Csaba Koszta, Dorota Kotowska, Riho Marja, Brigitta Palotás, Borbála Szabó, Attila Torma, András Báldi, Erzsébet Hornung, Zoltán László, Zsolt Molnár, Jenő J. Purger, Gábor Seress, István Urák, Dragica Purger, Krisztina Sándor, László Somay, Gabriella Süle, Orsolya Valkó, Andreea Rebeka Zsigmond, Christina Fischer, Lorenzo Marini, Teja Tscharntke, Katalin Szitár, Edina Török","doi":"10.1038/s41893-025-01592-y","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"Europe’s rural landscapes, shaped over millennia, support high biodiversity but often have lower living standards than urban areas, potentially leading to social and environmental injustice. Here we studied biodiversity and socioeconomic settings in Central and Eastern European villages across landscape complexity and urbanization gradients. We surveyed the biodiversity of villages by sampling nine taxonomic groups, including plants, arthropods and birds. We found 15% lower multitrophic diversity in villages in agricultural than in forest-dominated landscapes. City vicinity enhanced human well-being (estimated with Better Life Index) but did not affect biodiversity despite a larger human footprint. In agglomerated villages in forest-dominated landscapes, biodiversity was high, with higher Better Life Index and footprint metrics, suggesting associations between biodiversity, socioeconomic status and, thus, environmental injustice. Our results show the high socioecological value of maintaining or restoring landscape complexity around villages and their green infrastructure, requiring top-down incentives and bottom-up initiatives. While biodiversity levels have been studied in many different landscapes, villages have been relatively unexplored in comparison. This study examines biodiversity in Eastern European villages across landscape complexity and proximity to cities in the context of social and economic well-being.","PeriodicalId":19056,"journal":{"name":"Nature Sustainability","volume":"8 8","pages":"894-904"},"PeriodicalIF":27.1000,"publicationDate":"2025-07-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.nature.comhttps://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-025-01592-y.pdf","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Nature Sustainability","FirstCategoryId":"93","ListUrlMain":"https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-025-01592-y","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Europe’s rural landscapes, shaped over millennia, support high biodiversity but often have lower living standards than urban areas, potentially leading to social and environmental injustice. Here we studied biodiversity and socioeconomic settings in Central and Eastern European villages across landscape complexity and urbanization gradients. We surveyed the biodiversity of villages by sampling nine taxonomic groups, including plants, arthropods and birds. We found 15% lower multitrophic diversity in villages in agricultural than in forest-dominated landscapes. City vicinity enhanced human well-being (estimated with Better Life Index) but did not affect biodiversity despite a larger human footprint. In agglomerated villages in forest-dominated landscapes, biodiversity was high, with higher Better Life Index and footprint metrics, suggesting associations between biodiversity, socioeconomic status and, thus, environmental injustice. Our results show the high socioecological value of maintaining or restoring landscape complexity around villages and their green infrastructure, requiring top-down incentives and bottom-up initiatives. While biodiversity levels have been studied in many different landscapes, villages have been relatively unexplored in comparison. This study examines biodiversity in Eastern European villages across landscape complexity and proximity to cities in the context of social and economic well-being.
期刊介绍:
Nature Sustainability aims to facilitate cross-disciplinary dialogues and bring together research fields that contribute to understanding how we organize our lives in a finite world and the impacts of our actions.
Nature Sustainability will not only publish fundamental research but also significant investigations into policies and solutions for ensuring human well-being now and in the future.Its ultimate goal is to address the greatest challenges of our time.