Build up conservation research capacity in China for biodiversity governance

Without research backing from conservation scientists, policy makers might struggle to make informed decisions, leading to diminishing valuable resources and a deteriorating environment²⁹. The dwindling number of vertebrate conservation scientists may impair the ability to achieve the national goal of Ecological Civilization, and may negatively impact biodiversity conservation in countries along the Belt and Road Initiative, where well-trained conservation scientists might be even rarer. We argue that China, given its pursuit of economic growth and scientific excellence in the past decades, is well positioned and equipped to overcome this massive conservation shortfall. We propose several concrete solutions to address these limitations (Fig. 3). We also identify possible agencies, institutions and pathways to implement the practical recommendations.

The need of a different evaluation system

First and foremost, we need to decouple the performance evaluation system from impact factors. It is widely acknowledged that journal impact factors should not be used to rank individuals, especially from different fields^30,31,32. The abuse of impact factors has caused negative effects on individuals and academic society³³. Many organizations, journal editors and scientists have appealed to fight impact factor abuse³³. The existing evaluation system of the National Natural Sciences Foundation of China (NSFC), the largest scientific grant foundation in China, may be a feasible solution. Although NSFC funding is very competitive, it continues to be an objective and meaningful platform for scientists to contest with their own peers via a single-blind peer-review process.

We propose adopting the NSFC funding peer-review process for intra-institutional performance evaluation. In NSFC grant applications, applicants choose keywords and research directions when they submit their proposals and NSFC matches reviewers according to the keywords and research directions. Institution administrators can request disciplinary peer-review reports during promotion evaluation in the same way. We believe that relying less on an impact-factor-centred evaluation and adopting a concurrent peer-review performance evaluation system could level the playing field for all scientists within the same institution. As such, the fairer peer-review evaluation system may help to reverse the brain drain presently observed among vertebrate conservation scientists.

Promoting training and international exchanges

Second, we need to leverage and scale-up existing recruitment and training policies for conservation rapidly. Chinese universities and research institutes need to create more jobs for early-career conservation scientists. In addition, we should jointly train students locally and overseas through existing funding schemes (for example, the Chinese Scholarship Council, BRI scholarships; and The World Academy of Sciences internationally) to meet domestic and BRI conservation needs. According to a report from the Ministry of Education of China, more than 0.5 million Chinese students were studying abroad in 2016, and 35.5% of them were masters or PhD students³⁴. If Chinese institutions provide more employment opportunities, related research internships and experience, more students will likely major in conservation-related disciplines abroad. Recruiting young Chinese or foreign faculty with overseas PhDs will also help to reduce academic inbreeding in China (as illustrated in Fig. 1).

From the same report, there were already more than 0.2 million students from 64 BRI countries studying in China in 2016; 69% of them are graduate students and 61% of them are supported by Chinese scholarships³⁴. To encourage talented BRI students to major in conservation-related disciplines, the Chinese government should set up a new BRI-conservation scholarship fund with a higher quota than other more popular majors. These trained BRI graduates will benefit biodiversity conservation in their native countries, as well as China’s global effort in greening the BRI. As the BRI is slated to transform the lives and careers of many scientists, this is the window of opportunity for institutions like CAS and other leading universities to jointly train and build capacity for conservation research in both China and BRI countries³⁵.

Encouraging interdisciplinary collaboration

Third, we need to encourage and incentivize existing Chinese vertebrate conservation scientists to conduct more conservation-related research. Effective biodiversity conservation efforts require input and contribution from multiple disciplines, including but not limited to biology, ecology, economics, sociology, psychology, management, and decision sciences. In its present form, conservation in China is still predominantly biological science-based. Novel innovative knowledge institutions created from interdisciplinary collaboration could lead to adaptive learning-based approaches for addressing local conservation issues, where adopting a one-size fits all solution is challenging. Interdisciplinary programmes in China could be modelled after those at the Oxford Martin School at the University of Oxford, UK³⁶ and the Earth Institute at Columbia University, US³⁷, for example, which are well-known research and policy institutes, where they invest in research and take multi-disciplinary approaches in addressing complex issues such as climate change, ecosystems and illegal wildlife trade. Such programmes could bring together researchers from across disciplines to find conservation solutions in China.

Additionally, establishing endowed chairs in interdisciplinary conservation science research could aid in mentoring young scholars and researchers early into their career to do interdisciplinary research, thereby promoting continuity. Under the backdrop of accelerating biodiversity loss³⁸, conservation scientists have the moral responsibility to consider implications of their research for national and global biodiversity conservation. The research to implementation gap is a formidable barrier to successful conservation effort; however, interdisciplinary collaborations may help to bridge and overcome it²³. As such, we also encourage conservation scientists to actively engage with practitioners and to participate in conservation decision-making and intervention³⁹, where it is critical to ensure that their evidence-based research becomes embedded in practical conservation management and policy. For instance, armed with recent and reliable tiger and leopard population estimates from a network of 2,000 motion-sensing cameras, Chinese conservation scientists were able to advise the Central Government of China to establish a 14,600 km² Northeast Tiger and Leopard National Park in 2017, which is now one of the largest national parks in China^40,41.

Fostering international collaborative networks

Finally, due to the geographic scope and impacts of the BRI coupled with weak domestic conservation research capacity, Chinese conservation scientists should actively create and draw on more international conservation networks to collaboratively work on meeting regional conservation needs¹⁴. This is particularly important considering that researchers from the UK and USA, and those based in the international agencies, have extensive experience and engagement with local organizations in BRI countries on conservation and development projects, including those across international borders. Existing bi-lateral international cooperative research grants between China’s NSFC and the US’s National Science Foundation and UK’s Research Councils⁴²; and the United Nations Environment Programme⁴³ and from Universities Alliance for Silk Road⁴⁴ could pave the way for joint conservation research initiatives.

Through these recommendations, we believe that the proliferation of Chinese conservation scientists could trigger general conservation science development locally and provide scientific support for China to meet ambitious sustainable development goals such as a green BRI and the growing conservation needs domestically and regionally. In sum, China must urgently act to make up for massive shortfalls in conservation research capacity and research collaborative networks for long-term biodiversity governance.