DOI: 10.5061/dryad.jq2bvq87m
title: Proactive conservation to prevent habitat losses to agricultural expansion

description: The projected loss of millions of square kilometres of natural ecosystems
 to meet future demand for food, animal feed, fibre, and bioenergy crops is
 likely to massively escalate threats to biodiversity. Reducing these
 threats requires a detailed knowledge of how and where they are likely to
 be most severe. We developed a geographically explicit model of future
 agricultural land clearance based on observed historic changes and combine
 the outputs with species-specific habitat preferences for 19,859 species
 of terrestrial vertebrates. We project that 87.7% of these species will
 lose habitat to agricultural expansion by 2050, with 1,280 species
 projected to lose ≥25% of their habitat. Proactive policies targeting how,
 where, and what food is produced could reduce these threats, with a
 combination of approaches potentially preventing almost all these losses
 while contributing to healthier human diets. As international biodiversity
 targets are set to be updated in 2021, these results highlight the
 importance of proactive efforts to safeguard biodiversity by reducing
 demand for agricultural land.
description: Full methods are available in the "Methods" and
 "Supplementary Information" of the accompanying paper, and in
 the code uploaded here. Note that not all data can be shared.
 Specifically: The habitat maps are not
 available to be shared. Please contact the corresponding authors for more
 information. We have not included the projections of
 future agricultural land cover, but will happily share these files. Please
 email the corresponding authors so we can keep track of how the data are
 being used.
description: The code assumes that the following directories are set
 up: "./Data/ModellingData/"
 —containing the .csv files with the prefix
 "ModellingData_..." "/Data/"
 —containing "MollweideCountryID_1.5km_IMPACT.tif",
 "ProportionCrop_2010.tif",
 "ProportionPasture_2010.tif", "ISO_translation.csv",
 "ProportionalTargets.csv",
 "RegionLookUp.csv"
 "./Data/CountryRasters/" —containing the raster
 identifying countries and with cell indices
 "Data/ESHFiles/" —containing the habitat maps for
 species. <strong>NOTE: </strong>These data are not available
 to be shared. Please contact the corresponding authors for more
 information. "Data/HabitatSuitabilityData/"
 — containing habitat suitability data for species
 "./Outputs/Model_Coefficients/" —containing the .rda
 files which end "..._Coefs.rda"
 "./Outputs/BAU/tifs" —where the country-specific
 projections will be stored. Change "BAU" to whatever scenario
 you are running
 "./Outputs/WorldAgProjections/..." —where
 scenario-specific agricultural projections will be stored.
 <strong>NOTE</strong>: These data are not included in this
 repository. Please email the corresponding authors so we can keep track of
 how the data are being used (we will share them freely, we just want to be
 able to advise).
 "./Outputs/ESHTables_EATLancet/" —containing the
 estimates of the loss of extent of suitable habitat 
 Scripts need to be run in order. File names are numbered; the
 sequence is: Model fitting
 scripts Converting agricultural land
 Combining the rasters produced into a world map
 Overlaying this world map with maps of suitable
 habitat Calculating habitat loss from
 these