Effectiveness of Protected Areas in conserving biodiversity and ecosystem processes

Biodiversity is declining at an unprecedented rate under the combined effects of climate change and land-use intensification, threatening ecosystem functioning. Protected Areas (PAs) are central to conservation strategies, yet their effectiveness in conserving biodiversity and sustaining ecosystem processes remains insufficiently quantified. Conservation assessments still rely largely on taxonomic metrics, often overlooking functional traits, despite their key role in mediating species’ responses to environmental pressures and their contributions to ecosystem processes. An additional, frequently neglected dimension is intraspecific trait variability (ITV), which can enhance population persistence and buffer ecosystems against environmental change. Focusing on different forest habitats at national scale (Italy), the PACE project will assess how PAs influence biodiversity patterns and ecosystem processes over space and time by resampling vegetation plots inside and outside PAs along a latitudinal gradient. Field-based trait measurements, including ITV, will be combined with existing forest and environmental databases to quantify how species traits shape community vulnerability to global change and drive key ecosystem processes such as carbon storage and nutrient cycling. The project will provide a trait-based evaluation of PA effectiveness and deliver actionable insights to improve conservation planning, habitat management, and the long-term maintenance of ecosystem services under ongoing environmental change.