adaptive management to protect biodiversity best available science and the endangered species act适应性管理,保护生物多样性最好的科学和《濒危物种法》.pdfVIP

Diversity 2012, 4, 164-178; doi:10.3390/d4020164 OPEN ACCESS diversity ISSN 1424-2818 /journal/diversity Article Adaptive Management to Protect Biodiversity: Best Available Science and the Endangered Species Act Olivia Odom Green * and Ahjond S. Garmestani National Risk Management Research Laboratory, United States Environmental Protection Agency, 26 West Martin Luther King, Cincinnati, OH 45268, USA; E-Mail: garmestani.ahjond@ * Author to whom correspondence should be addressed; E-Mail: Green.Olivia@; Tel.: +1-513-569-7098. Received: 13 February 2012; in revised form: 20 March 2012 / Accepted: 21 March 2012 / Published: 30 March 2012 Abstract: Although flawed, the most powerful tool for protecting biodiversity in the United States is the Endangered Species Act, which requires the use of the best available science to ensure that endangered and threatened species are not put in jeopardy of extinction. Unfortunately, the best available science mandate is virtually meaningless and imposes no additional scientific rigor in agency decision making beyond what is normally required of administrative procedures. In this paper, we propose to define best available science in a way that shifts from a way of using science to a way of doing science, and a sound method of doing science for wildlife management and climate change is via the principles of adaptive management [1]. Adaptive management, as a means of data accumulation a