bioethanol |
See 'Biofuel'.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
biofuel |
Fuel made from biomass.
|
Europe and Central Asia assessment, Global assessment (1st work programme), Americas assessment, Asia-Pacific assessment, Land degradation and restoration assessment |
biogas |
See 'Biofuel'.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
biogenic volatile organic compound |
Compounds that include organic atmospheric trace gases other than carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide; isoprenoids (isoprene and monoterpenes) are among the most prominent BVOC emitted (Kesselmeier & Staudt, 1999).
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
biogeochemical cycle |
Biogeochemical cycles involve the fluxes of chemical elements among different parts of the Earth: from living to non-living, from atmosphere to land to sea, and from soils to plants.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
biogeochemistry |
The field of biogeochemistry deals with the effect of biological organisms on the chemistry of the Earth.
|
Sustainable use assessment |
biological conservation |
See also 'Biodiversity conservation'. Application of science to conservation problems addressing the biology of species, communities and the ecosystem that are perturbed either directly or indirectly by human or other agents. Its goal is to provide principles and tools for preserving biological diversity. The branch of biology that deals with threats to biodiversity and with preserving the biologic and genetic diversity of animals and plants.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
biological control |
A method of controlling pests such as insects, mites, weeds and plant diseases using other organisms. It relies on predation, parasitism, herbivory, or other natural mechanisms, but typically also involves an active human management role. It can be an important component of integrated pest management (IPM) programs.
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Land degradation and restoration assessment |
biological diversity |
See biodiversity.
|
Europe and Central Asia assessment |
biological oxygen demand |
See 'Biochemical Oxygen Demand (BOD)'.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
biological pump |
The fixation of carbon at the oceans' surface by photosynthesizing organisms and subsequent sinking of a sizable fraction (15-20%) of total productivity creates a strong vertical transport that dominates the distribution of carbon, nutrients, and oxygen in the ocean, known as the ‘biological pump’.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
biological resource |
Biological resources include genetic resources, organisms or parts thereof, populations, or any other biotic component of ecosystems with actual or potential use or value for humanity.
|
Sustainable use assessment, Global assessment (1st work programme) |
biological sustainable level (fished within) |
In fisheries organizations, biological sustainable levels are usually defined according to MSY, which is the Maximum Sustainable Yield (or catch) that can be continuously taken from a stock under existing environmental conditions without affecting its reproductive potential. Two key levels are considered: to assess the sustainability of fishing on a given stock: FMSY which is the fishing mortality that is consistent with achieving MSY and BMSY that is the biomass that results from fishing at FMSY for a long time.
|
Sustainable use assessment |
biomass (ecology) |
The mass of non-fossilized and biodegradable organic material in a given area or volume.
|
Sustainable use assessment |
biomass (for production) |
Biological material that can be used as fuel or for industrial production. Includes solid biomass such as wood, plant and animal products, gases and liquids derived from biomass, industrial waste and municipal waste.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
biomass |
see Biomass (ecology).
|
|
biomass (ecology) |
The mass of non-fossilized and biodegradable organic material originating from plants, animals and micro-organisms in a given area or volume.
|
Africa assessment, Land degradation and restoration assessment, Asia-Pacific assessment, Global assessment (1st work programme), Americas assessment, Europe and Central Asia assessment |
biome |
Global-scale zones, generally defined by the type of plant life that they support in response to average rainfall and temperature patterns. For example, tundra, coral reefs or savannahs.
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Americas assessment, Global assessment (1st work programme), Land degradation and restoration assessment |
biome |
Biomes are global-scale zones, generally defined by the type of plant life that they support in response to average rainfall and temperature patterns. For example, tundra, coral reefs or savannas.
|
Europe and Central Asia assessment, Asia-Pacific assessment, Africa assessment |
biophysical system |
An assemblage of interacting biological and physical processes.
|
Asia-Pacific assessment |
biophysical value |
Measures of the importance of components of nature (living being or non-living element), of the processes that are derived from the interactions among these components, or of particular properties of those components and processes.
|
Scenarios and models assessment |
bioprospecting |
The process of searching for and subsequently developing new drugs based on biological resources.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme), Land degradation and restoration assessment |
bioremediation |
The use of microorganisms to clean up polluted soil and water.
|
Land degradation and restoration assessment |
biosecurity |
Strategy, efforts and planning to protect human, animal and environmental health against biological threats.
|
Land degradation and restoration assessment |
biosphere |
The sum of all the ecosystems of the world. It is both the collection of organisms living on the Earth and the space that they occupy on part of the Earth's crust (the lithosphere), in the oceans (the hydrosphere) and in the atmosphere. The biosphere is all the planet's ecosystems.
|
Scenarios and models assessment, Asia-Pacific assessment, Sustainable use assessment, Europe and Central Asia assessment, Land degradation and restoration assessment, Americas assessment |
biota |
All living organisms of an area; the flora and fauna considered as a unit.
|
Europe and Central Asia assessment, Americas assessment, Sustainable use assessment, Land degradation and restoration assessment, Asia-Pacific assessment |
biotechnology (modern) |
Modern biotechnology means the application of: In vitro nucleic acid techniques, including recombinant deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) and direct injection of nucleic acid into cells or organelles, or Fusion of cells beyond the taxonomic family, that overcome natural physiological reproductive or recombination barriers and that are not techniques used in traditional breeding and selection.
|
Sustainable use assessment |
biotechnology |
A method for mitigating land degradation using mechanical (structures) and biological elements.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme), Land degradation and restoration assessment |
biotechnology |
Any technological application that uses biological systems, living organisms, or derivatives thereof, to make or modify products or processes for specific use.
|
|
bioterrorism |
The deliberate, private use of biological agents to harm and frighten the people of a state or society, is related to the military use of biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons.
|
Land degradation and restoration assessment |
biotic homogenization |
See homogenization.
|
Europe and Central Asia assessment |
black carbon |
Black carbon is a carbonaceous aerosol. It is produced both naturally and by human activities as a result of the incomplete combustion of fossil fuels, biofuels, and biomass. Primary sources include emissions from diesel engines, cook stoves, wood burning and forest fires. Black carbon particles strongly absorb sunlight and give soot its black color. Thus, black carbon has emerged as a major contributor to global climate change, possibly second only to CO2 as the main driver of change.
|
Asia-Pacific assessment |
blue carbon |
The carbon stored in marine and coastal ecosystems.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
bog |
An entirely rainfed wetland area that typically accumulates peat.
|
Land degradation and restoration assessment |
Bonn challenge |
A global effort to restore 150 million hectares of the world’s degraded and deforested lands by 2020 and 350 million hectares by 2030. It is overseen by the Global Partnership on Forest Landscape Restoration, with the International Union for Conservation of Nature as its Secretariat.
|
Americas assessment |
bottom-up |
Systems driven by basic or lower- order processes.
|
Asia-Pacific assessment |
bottom-up control of the food web |
A mode of control of trophic interactions by resources, in which organisms on each trophic level are food limited, as opposed to a top-down control (by predators), in which organisms at the top of food chains are food limited, and at successive lower levels, they are alternately predator, then food limited.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
boundary object |
Objects and/or processes plastic enough to adapt to local needs and to the constraints of the several parties employing them, yet robust enough to maintain a common identity across sites. Their meanings may differ in different social contexts, but their structure is common enough and recognizable across contexts.
|
Americas assessment |
brackish water |
Inland water with a high salt concentration.
|
Land degradation and restoration assessment |
brackish water |
Water that has more salinity than fresh water, but not as much as seawater. It may result from mixing of seawater with fresh water, as in estuaries, or it may occur in brackish fossil aquifers. Technically, brackish water contains between 0.5 and 30 grams of salt per litre—more often expressed as 0.5 to 30 parts per thousand (‰), which is a specific gravity of between 1.005 and 1.010. Thus, brackish covers a range of salinity regimes and is not considered a precisely defined condition.
|
Asia-Pacific assessment |
breadth |
refers to change across multiple spheres, with emerging consensus that transformation requires co-evolutionary change across different spheres of society, including personal, economic, political, institutional and technological ones.
|
Values assessment |
broad values |
They refer to life goals, general guiding principles and orientations towards the world that are informed by people’s beliefs and worldviews. Broad values include moral principles, such as justice, belonging, freedom, but also life goals, like enjoyment, health, prosperity. Broad values influence specific values and provide them with a general context and meaning.
|
Values assessment |
buen vivir |
Although no universal definition of buen vivir has been attained yet, it has four common constitutive elements: (a) the idea of harmony with nature (including its abiotic components); (b) vindication of the principles and values of marginalized/subordinated peoples; (c) the State as guarantor of the satisfaction of basic needs (such as education, health, food and water), social justice and equality; and (d) democracy. There are also two cross-cutting lines: buen vivir as a critical paradigm of Eurocentric (anthropocentric, capitalist, economistic and universalistic) modernity, and as a new intercultural political project.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme), Americas assessment |
buen vivir |
An alternative to economic development-centered approaches, generally defined as forming part of the Andean indigenous cosmology, based on the belief that true wellbeing is only possible as part of a community in a broad sense, including people, nature and the Earth, linked by mutual responsibilities and obligations, and that the wellbeing of the community is above that of the individual.
|
|
buffer (ecology) |
A natural or anthropogenic feature which separates land uses.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
buffer zones (protected areas) |
Areas between core protected areas and the surrounding landscape or seascape which protect the network from potentially damaging external influences and which are essentially transitional areas.
|
Global assessment (1st work programme) |
built environment |
Comprises urban design, land use and the transportation system, and encompasses patterns of human activity within the physical environment.
|
Land degradation and restoration assessment |
bumble bee |
Members of the bee genus Bombus; they are social insects that form colonies with a single queen, or brood parasitic or cuckoo bumblebees (previously Psithyrus). Currently 262 species are known, which are found primarily in higher latitudes and at higher altitudes in the Northern Hemisphere, although they also occur in South America and New Zealand (where they were introduced).
|
Pollination assessment |
burden |
The resulting negative impacts of ecosystem use and management on people and nature, including distant, diffuse and delayed impacts.
|
Sustainable use assessment, Global assessment (1st work programme) |
bureau |
The IPBES Bureau is a subsidiary body established by the Plenary which carries out the governance functions of the Platform. It is made up of representatives nominated from each of the United Nations regions, and is chaired by the Chair of IPBES.
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