The implementation of climate-smart policies to enhance carbon sequestration and reduce
emissions is being encouraged worldwide to fight climate change. Afforestation practices and
rewilding initiatives are climate-smart examples suggested to tackle these issues. In contrast,
fire-smart approaches, by stimulating traditional farmland activities or agroforestry practices,
could also assist climate regulation while protecting biodiversity. However, there is scarce
information concerning the potential impacts of these alternative land management strategies on
climate regulation ecosystem services and biodiversity conservation. As such, this work simulates
future effects of different land management strategies in the Transboundary Biosphere Reserve of
Meseta Ibérica (Portugal-Spain). Climate-smart (‘Afforestation’, ‘Rewilding’) and fire-smart
(‘Farmland recovery’, ‘Agroforestry recovery’) scenarios were modelled over a period of 60 years
(1990–2050), and their impacts on climate regulation services were evaluated. Species distribution
models for 207 vertebrates were built and future gains/losses in climate-habitat suitability were
quantified. Results suggest climate-smart policies as the best for climate regulation (0.98 Mg
C ha−1 yr−1 of mean carbon sequestration increase and 6801.5 M€ of avoided economic losses in
2020–2050 under Afforestation scenarios), while providing the largest habitat gains for threatened
species (around 50% for endangered and critically endangered species under Rewilding scenarios).
Fire-smart scenarios also benefit carbon regulation services (0.82 Mg C ha−1 yr−1 of mean carbon
sequestration increase and 3476.3 M€ of avoided economic losses in 2020–2050 under Agroforestry
scenarios), benefiting the majority of open-habitat species. This study highlights the main
challenges concerning management policies in European rural mountains, while informing
decision-makers regarding landscape planning under global change.
This research was supported by Portuguese national
funds through FCT—Foundation for Science and Technology, I P, under the FirESmart project (PCIF/MOG/0083/2017) and by project INMODES
(CGL2017-89999-C2-2-R), funded by the Spanish
Ministry of Science and Innovation. CITAB was funded
by national funds by FCT under the project
UIDB/04033/2020. AR was supported by Xunta de
Galicia (ED481B2016/084-0), the IACOBUS program
(INTERREG V-A España–Portugal, POCTEP
2014–2020) and currently by ‘Juan de la Cierva’ fellowship
program funded by the Spanish Ministry
of Science and Innovation (IJC2019-041033-I). ÂS
received support from the Portuguese Foundation for
Science and Technology (FCT) through PhD Grant
SFRH/BD/132838/2017, funded by the Ministry of
Science, Technology and Higher Education, and by
the European Social Fund—Operational Program
Human Capital within the 2014–2020 EU Strategic
Framework. V H was supported by a Ramón y Cajal
contract funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science
and Innovation (RYC-2013-13979).
