Improving soil health and soil biological communities through agroecological management approaches will be essential for mitigating the environmental impacts of agricultural intensification in the future. In order to demonstrate some of the values of agroecological practices, this meta-analysis estimates the value of soil biological communities through the earthworms impact on the productivity of global cereal and legume crops.

To safeguard biodiversity, 44% of the global land area needs to be covered by conservation measures such as protected areas or land use policies, finds this paper. The proportion of land that must be conserved varies by country, with high values in countries such as Canada (84%, because of its extensive intact ecosystems), and Costa Rica (86%, because it hosts many species). On average, the calculated values show that more land should be conserved in developed economies (55%) than in developing economies (30%), partly due to large ecologically intact areas of Canada and Australia. The authors stress that any conservation policies must respect the rights of people living in the affected areas.

This paper quantifies the greenhouse gas mitigation potential, cost and feasibility of land-based climate measures such as forest protection, carbon sequestration through agriculture, bioenergy, reducing food waste and shifting to healthy sustainable diets. Across 250 countries and regions, the paper finds that cost-effective measures (defined as those costing up to $100/tCO2eq.) could mitigate 8–13.8 GtCO2eq yr−1 between 2020 and 2050. For context, emissions from Agriculture, Forestry and other Land Uses (AFOLU) were ~12 GtCO2eq yr−1 between 2007 and 2016.

The United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity has released the first draft of a new Global Biodiversity Framework. The framework is built around a vision of “living in harmony with nature” by 2050, and sets out 21 targets for protecting biodiversity to be achieved by 2030. It stresses that civil society, indigenous and local communities, women, youth and business and finance communities must all be involved in implementing the framework.

This briefing paper by the COP26 Universities Network explains what nature-based solutions (NbS) are and sets out policy recommendations for their implementation in the UK, spanning the UK’s chance to use the COP26 summit to promote the global adoption of good practice principles for NbS, strategic planning at the landscape scale, the economic incentives needed for NbS schemes to be effective, metrics and monitoring, and involving communities.

This special issue of the journal Restoration Ecology examines trends, opportunities and research gaps in the restoration of grassland ecosystems. TABLE readers may be particularly interested in the special issue’s coverage of grazing and land-use legacies.

This paper discusses the ways in which nature-based solutions (NbS) to climate change and biodiversity loss are framed and understood, and traces the growth of interest in NbS among researchers, governments, NGOs and the private sector. It sets out four guiding principles for policymakers, practitioners and researchers to implement NbS in ways that provide benefits to the environment and society. 

This book, based on the Planetary Health Diet produced by the EAT-Lancet Commission, discusses how dietary patterns influence health and the environment and make recommendations for which food groups to favour and which to avoid.

In this report, charity Rewilding Britain argues that natural regeneration is the best method of reforesting large areas of land across the UK, and that more active methods (such as planting trees) should be reserved for cases where natural regeneration would be more difficult. The report suggests that doubling woodland cover from 13% to 26% by 2030 is both desirable and achievable. The report stresses that woodland regeneration should take place in a way that supports rural livelihoods and engages communities.