We are happy to share our most recent paper Assessing global popularity and threats to Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas using social media data (Hausmann et al. 2019) available open access in Science of The Total Environment.

This analysis looks into popularity and threats to Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas (IBAs); we used social media data to assess global visitation rates, attractiveness and use pressure at IBAs worldwide.

We found that 17% of all IBAs under very high threat also received high visitation rates.

Results of this paper suggest which IBAs would benefit from enhanced monitoring to mitigate potential risks related to site visitation, and to make the most of the benefits of tourism for conservation.

This work, lead by Dr. Anna Hausmann, is a collaboration between researchers from the HELICS lab, Digital Geography Lab, the IUCN and BirdLife international.

Read more in the original paper: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2019.05.268

the press releases:

• https://www.helsinki.fi/en/news/science-news/social-media-data-reveal-where-visitors-to-nature-locations-provide-potential-benefits-or-threats-to-biodiversity
• http://www.birdlife.org/worldwide/news/could-social-media-help-us-save-some-world%E2%80%99s-most-vital-habitats

and follow the discussion on Twitter:

"Assessing global popularity and threats to Important Bird and Biodiversity Areas using social media data." New study in @STOTEN_journal in collaboration with @digigeolab @BirdLife_News @IUCN @HELSINKISUS @helsinkiuni @KumpulaScience https://t.co/HIZwwDMGPP pic.twitter.com/TlxZXIRSAN

— HELICS (@HELICS_Lab) May 23, 2019