How Can Biodiversity Net Gain from Construction Impact People?

ConSci

Oct 28, 2019

6 min read

Updated: May 18, 2020

The Story So Far:

The first reading of the UK 2019-2020 Environment Bill took place recently on the 15th October, and what featured was a commitment to mandatory biodiversity net gain (BNG) for many developments in England. A useful summary of the bill can be found on the CIEEM website. BNG differs from other mitigation practices in the construction sector as it requires a developer to demonstrate a measurably positive overall impact on biodiversity, rather than just no negative impacts known as ‘no net loss’.

With research focusing on the ecological aspects of demonstrating an overall gain in biodiversity, there has been growing concern over the potential social impacts of intentional changes in nature, both losses and gains from BNG. It’s important to consider how losses and gains in biodiversity can affect people as there are complex human-nature connections which can exist and be sensitive to change. Recent social research focusing on ‘no net loss’ development practices in Uganda and Madagascar found that there are identifiable social impacts on local people primarily from loss of land access, with adverse impacts magnified amongst more economically vulnerable groups.

Cue My Research Project:

The idea that people should be no worse off as a result of BNG practice led to the creation of an international guidance document that provides 16 good practice principles for addressing potential social impacts relating to BNG. Supervised by Dr. Julia Baker, a contributing author to the guidance document, I undertook a social research project to apply these 16 principles to a UK case study and investigate how losses and gains in biodiversity from development can impact people’s lives. It is the first known case study investigating the potential social impacts of BNG within a developed country context and, as deep as my exploration into the current literature has gone, a global first too. A UK case study of a rural social infrastructure development project was selected, with a retrospective look at the negative impacts on biodiversity that had previously occurred during the construction phase. The majority of gains in biodiversity associated with the development involved a habitat enhancement project on a nearby site alongside on-site tree planting and wildflower seeding. Bird, bat, and insect habitat boxes had also been installed.

I developed 6 main interview questions to investigate values local people in a nearby village placed on nature, and how perceived losses and gains in biodiversity from the development had affected their quality of life. I interviewed local residents and individuals who had been involved in the design/ implementation of the development project and any associated ecological work. A key consideration of my research is data collected represents the perceptions of those interviewed. What people perceive to have happened, and what is reality, can often create a grey area creating friction between the developer and local people.

Key Findings:

I used the 16 social good practice principles to aid in categorising the perceived impacts mentioned by the participants, the impacts being any losses or gains in biodiversity the interviewees felt had affected their quality of life. 6 of 16 principles are represented below.

Principle 3: Timescale

Summary: Immediate loss versus uncertain future gains.

Participants spoke of feeling an immediate loss of the nature they value, whilst expressing uncertainty over whether the gains enacted by the development could compensate for the perceived negative impacts on their lives.
People can feel negatively impacted during a potentially temporary window of biodiversity loss and, if long term compensation measures have been put in place, perhaps the time lag from loss to gain needs to be addressed.

Principle 4: Reference Scenario

Summary: Sentimental values attached to nature can create a dynamic biodiversity baseline condition.

Sentimental memories people have of nature can influence how they perceive the losses in biodiversity to have affected their lives. Values placed on nature derived from memories could mean that what a developer may consider a low biodiversity value grassland, in fact could hold a sensitive social value to people of cherished memories.
I propose conceptualising this phenomenon as a ‘nostalgic baseline’, a baseline condition from which people affected by losses in biodiversity may use to measure any perceived gains against.

Principle 6: Aggregation of People

Summary: Aggregating affected people into groups by use values, age, length of residency, or proximity to development or BNG site.

The different uses people have for the surrounding nature had an influence over the impacts they felt on their lives. Aggregating groups this way, for example as ‘dog walkers’, ‘runners’, or ‘cyclists’, could give some insight into the different ways some people perceive the changes in nature to have impacted them.
Age could also be considered an aggregation of groups, with elderly people tending to attach different social values to nature than younger people.
The participant’s length of residency in the area was another important influencing factor in how they felt affected. A new resident may not have experienced the surrounding nature many times, whereas for a resident who’s lived locally for decades there may be high sentimental value from years of visiting the nature areas.
Perhaps an obvious aggregation found was the household’s proximity to the development site, with residents who lived closer feeling they’d lost more than just their enjoyment of using the natural areas but also their separation from the previously hidden development site.

Principle 8: Aligning Objectives

Summary: Potential clash between biodiversity gains and social values.

Whilst the aim of BNG may be to establish a high biodiversity value habitat, this same habitat may not hold the same social value which local people placed on the nature they perceived as lost. This is an example of the potential clash between ecological and social objectives.
The aim of a habitat enhancement project may be to improve the biodiversity value of an area, however this may differ from what people want as compensation for any loss. Imagine a local playing field and the variety of uses and social cohesion value attached to these greenspaces, however they aren’t often areas of high biodiversity value.

Principle 11: Stakeholder Engagement

Summary: Potential to lessen social impacts with consultation; socio-economic targets appeared to be the main focus of engagement.

If local people were consulted throughout the development project, then perhaps feelings of distrust could have been resolved. The project’s stakeholder engagement focused on socio-economic targets such as local employment and training schemes. However, people who feel negatively impacted by the losses in biodiversity aren’t always the same people who would benefit from these employment schemes, thus limiting the compensation they can receive for the social impacts they feel.
Incorporating community engagement schemes with the upkeep of any habitats created through the BNG work could be a great way to get local people on board, with potential benefits for biodiversity and people.

Principle 16: Transparency

Summary: Lack of information leading to negative perceptions and feelings of distrust.

It appeared that lack of information about the developer’s work had influence over the negative perceptions participants had about the development project and any perceived losses and gains in biodiversity. Being unaware of the project activities and feeling excluded from the decision-making process seemed to exacerbate these negative perceptions, with feelings of distrust being harboured.
Improving transparency could address negative perceptions as awareness is raised, hearsay reduced, and any potential issues resolved early and collaboratively.

Principle (new): Public Knowledge

Summary: Knowledge of ecological mitigation process; responsibilities of developer

This final principle does not feature in the good practice principles, however it was a separate consideration I found when interpreting the data. From the responses given by many participants, it appeared that the ecological mitigation process and the responsibilities of a developer in this process were not generally known. BNG practitioners may need to consider the potential lack of public knowledge of the BNG process and the appearance of mitigation measures.
This addresses the wider issue of ecological knowledge which may, or may not, exist within the public sphere. This potential lack of knowledge can cause adverse social impacts as participants perceive nature as being negatively impacted during BNG habitat compensation works.

Conclusion:

The majority of these impacts may seem fairly intuitive, but what this research does is demonstrate how reaching out to the community could bring to light how losses and gains in biodiversity can affect people’s lives. Developers may achieve a BNG, however with the human-nature connection taken into account then there are much deeper considerations to be made, and it cannot be assumed all those affected by the losses will benefit from the gains.

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