Carolyn J. Lundquist

Global biodiversity scenarios have long struggled to capture the diversity of ways people value and relate to nature, favoring instrumental, growth-oriented framings over relational and intrinsic perspectives. The Nature Futures Framework (NFF) was developed to address this gap, offering a pluralistic, target-seeking approach to imagining nature-positive futures. This Special Feature brings together contributions that advance the operationalization of the NFF across methods, geographies, and thematic domains—from visioning, narrative development and participatory co-creation to quantitative modeling and governance design. Drawing on these papers, we identify three cross-cutting lessons: the NFF functions best as a boundary object for negotiating plural values rather than a fixed typology; its operationalization depends on combining narratives, indicators, models, deliberation, and institutional design rather than any single method; and its next frontier lies in implementation, linking NFF-based scenarios to the policy instruments and governance institutions such as the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework. We highlight the NFF’s strengths in fostering value pluralism, expanding the scope of possible futures, and identifying trade-offs and synergies among competing priorities. However, we also acknowledge the following persistent challenges: translating qualitative, place-based values into quantitative models, preventing the standardization of relational values, and navigating the normative and political tensions involved in defining “desirable” futures. In closing, we outline a research agenda centered on developing pluralistic indicators, strengthening integrated social-ecological modeling, exploring alternative economic paradigms, and deepening inclusive co-production. As global biodiversity governance shifts toward implementation, we argue that the NFF is now well positioned to move from concept to practice.

Blue carbon ecosystems (BCE), including mangroves, saltmarshes, and seagrasses, provide essential functions and services globally but are increasingly challenged by climate change and other anthropogenic activities. In Aotearoa New Zealand (Aotearoa NZ), there is mounting interest in blue carbon as a nature‐based solution to climate change. Quantifying the monetary co‐benefits of BCE, in addition to carbon sequestration, can help illustrate the relative contribution of ecosystem services provided by existing habitats, as well as the potential additional value associated with restoration. Here, we estimated the value of provisioning, regulating, and cultural ecosystem services provided by BCE in Aotearoa NZ. We found that the most valuable ecosystem service provided by mangroves was carbon sequestration, while in saltmarsh and seagrass, the most valuable ecosystem services were waste treatment and existence, bequest values, respectively. Unit monetary valuations of ecosystem services range from NZD 3 ha ⁻¹ yr ⁻¹ (water flow regulation) to NZD 32,590 ha ⁻¹ yr ⁻¹ (climate regulation) for mangroves, NZD 8 ha ⁻¹ yr ⁻¹ (spiritual experience) to NZD 23,045 ha ⁻¹ yr ⁻¹ (waste treatment) for saltmarshes, and NZD 3 ha ⁻¹ yr ⁻¹ (water regulation) to NZD 14,512 ha ⁻¹ yr ⁻¹ (existence, bequest values) for seagrasses. The estimated national potential monetary value of ecosystem services provided by current habitats ranges from NZD 0.8–995 million yr ⁻¹ for mangroves (30,533 ha nationally), NZD 0.2–482 million yr ⁻¹ for saltmarshes (20,932 ha nationally), and NZD 0.2–216 million yr ⁻¹ for seagrasses (61,340 ha nationally). If drained areas were restored from drained agricultural use, values would increase accordingly. These results apply the benefit transfer approach (applying monetary values from analogous temperate ecosystems globally to estimate values in Aotearoa NZ) to generate indicative monetary benchmarks, which can help inform discussions around investment in BCE and long‐term coastal climate change adaptation decision‐making in Aotearoa NZ.

Transformational climate adaptation requires coordinated action across sectors and scales, enabled by governance arrangements that can address systemic barriers. Public-private partnerships (PPP) may provide such a mechanism by aligning incentives, pooling resources and fostering collaboration between government and industry. In this paper, we evaluate a national PPP, The Aotearoa Circle (The Circle), and how it has catalysed climate adaptation in Aotearoa New Zealand’s seafood sector. Commissioned by The Circle, we conducted adaptation pathways planning, a decision-support process that identifies and sequences adaptation strategies and actions to reduce future climate risk, for two fisheries and two aquaculture industries. The process engaged company, government, research and civil society stakeholders to design suites of incremental and transformational strategies to reach long-term industry goals, and actions to implement them. We analysed these outputs to assess the PPP’s relevance in enabling implementation. Amongst the transformational pathways, 48% of actions required collaboration by public and private entities. Strategies were also identified to address systemic adaptation barriers across the sector (agile regulation, climate forecasting, fleet decarbonisation, oceans research). For these, the majortiy of actions required leadership by The Circle or public-private collaborations. Key informant interviews revealed challenges in implementation of immediate actions. While some were underway, shifts in national government policies had resulted in uneven progress amongst the industries. Interviewees emphasised the necessity for The Circle to convene stakeholders and sustain momentum, but resourcing was a constraint. Our results highlight The Circle’s core role in enabling transformational adaptation within industries and across the sector. Yet the PPP remains vulnerable to political cycles, shifting public sector commitment and risk aversion. Strengthening PPP resourcing arrangements is necessary to action long-term adaptation, and to ensure iterative pathways planning.

The Nature Futures Framework (NFF), developed under the Intergovernmental Science–Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), serves as a catalyst for advancing new scenarios and models focused on biodiversity and ecosystem services within the broader research community. In particular, the framework facilitates the development of scenarios and models that can help guide change processes toward desirable futures for nature and people. This paper assesses 31 studies that have engaged with the NFF since its introduction in 2020, aiming to identify which research areas have been addressed, and where development needs remain. The applications exhibit a large diversity in terms of locations, spatial scales, methods, outputs, and stakeholder involvement. The most common use of the framework has been in developing visions and scenarios. Nearly all studies engaged with diverse values of nature through the framework’s fundamental value perspectives: ‘Nature for Society’, ‘Nature for Nature’, and ‘Nature as Culture/One with Nature’. While the framework is generally perceived as useful, challenges remain in integrating the NFF across multiple scales and fully incorporating plural values, particularly in measuring relational aspects and avoiding Western-centric biases. Future research priorities include developing integrated, quantitative studies and exploring transformative pathways to enhance the framework's effectiveness in driving sustainable outcomes. Overall, the growing body of work using the NFF provides a strong foundation for distilling best practices, facilitating large-scale applications, and achieving the framework's objectives.

Evidence is lacking for what constitutes effective climate change adaptation to successfully conserve and steward ecosystems. Yet we urgently need this information to develop robust adaptation strategies to keep pace with unprecedented change, given our limited resources to do so. This includes not just understanding if a given strategy is effective in a single application, but perhaps more importantly if a given strategy has proven effective across sites where it has been applied, or has benefits only under certain sets of conditions. This learning across the field of adaptation is currently missing and is what is necessary for bringing adaptation to scale. We propose an approach that can guide adaptation efficacy testing under varying levels of baseline knowledge and ecosystem complexity. The approach includes clearly defining conservation goals and climate vulnerabilities, methodically collecting site and climate metrics to inform analysis of efficacy, and evaluating and communicating both positive and negative results in order to advance the adaptation field. Using this approach with meta‐analyses and post‐hoc testing can quickly scale efficacy testing in a meaningful way. Furthermore, explicitly incorporating efficacy testing into adaptation processes can support the growth of the adaptation field and spark creative, adaptive management approaches that will increase the likelihood of reducing climate change vulnerability.

Aim: Understanding the distribution of marine biodiversity is critical for evidence‐based identification of areas for protection and restoration. Taxonomic richness is a key, intuitive component of biodiversity and is often used to guide marine spatial planning and protection. In this study, we explore the relative merits of two spatial modelling approaches, stacked species distribution models (S‐SDMs) and macro‐ecological models (MEMs), for mapping the richness of benthic invertebrate taxa.Location: New Zealand Exclusive Economic Zone.Methods: Two hundred and seven individual layers from SDMs of benthic invertebrate genera were pooled from an existing database and stacked to create a single genera richness layer. The same occurrence data used to develop the SDMs, comprising over 120k occurrences, was used to fit MEMs using an ensemble modelling approach.Results: The S‐SDM layer performed poorly when validated against a database of observed genera richness, while the MEM approach performed well. While there were some consistencies in the areas predicted as high richness, substantial differences between the methods were also apparent, with the MEM seemingly better able to discern nuanced, fine‐scale patterns in richness. Areas of high richness predicted by the MEM include parts of the Chatham Rise, a large component of the sub‐Antarctic region, continental‐shelf and coastal habitat in the south of the South Island, the north‐east coast of the North Island, around East Cape and the Kermadec, Lau‐Colville and Macquarie Ridges.Main Conclusions: Spatial and catchability biases in the underlying occurrence data may contribute to the poor performance of the S‐SDM and suggest the approach may not be appropriate when using occurrence datasets with limited systematic sampling. The predictions from the MEM provide the best available information for the distribution of benthic invertebrate richness for New Zealand waters and thus offer important information for current and future marine spatial planning processes.

The sediments in mangrove forests play an important role in the global carbon cycle due to high inputs of organic matter (OM) and low decomposition rates, making them highly efficient at sequestering carbon. The balance between OM sequestration and decomposition in these systems is influenced by a complex interplay of environmental factors. However, there is a large amount of uncertainty surrounding decomposition rates from mangrove forests, particularly at regional scales. We used standardized decomposition assays of a labile and recalcitrant substrate in 30 estuaries, spanning a gradient in human land use intensity, to identify dominant drivers of OM decomposition in temperate mangrove forests. Our results reveal that, while labile OM decomposition is strongly driven by eutrophication, recalcitrant OM decomposition is primarily influenced by increases in the minimum sediment temperature. Furthermore, we demonstrate that nutrient enrichment from human land use, in combination with increased sediment temperature, synergistically accelerates the decomposition of labile OM, thereby threatening the carbon sequestration potential of these ecosystems. This suggests that coastal eutrophication can exacerbate the effects of warming on decomposition, leading to heightened vulnerability of carbon storage and potential feedbacks between local and global stressors.