Recommendations

Agreement on data (e.g. cultural and ecological indicators of change) collection, management, and sharing of information. Baseline data and other information about the status and health of plants, animals and ecosystems in and around mine sites are important for the mining industry, communities, government agencies and CAFF. An important challenge is to ensure that data generated by the mining industry are accessible in a form that can inform broader understandings of Arctic biodiversity status and trends.

Government agencies could:

• Agree to participate in collaborative processes to identify and use common indicators that capture thecultural, social, and economic impacts of mining.
• Provide data to a common repository where data could be available to be shared.

Mining industry could:

• Agree to participate in collaborative processes to identify and use common indicators that capture the cultural, social, and economic impacts of mining.
• Provide data to a common repository where it could be available to be shared.

CAFF could:

• Provide a common repository to make relevant data about the status and health of plants, animals and ecosystems in the Arctic available for other uses (Box 8).
• Work in cooperation with others to help develop common methodologies for data collection, analysis, management and reporting by the mining industry.
• Collect and share good practices for data collection and sharing.
• Work to ensure data provided to the CAFF is compatible with agency-mandated data collection or other standards where appropriate.
• Help to develop indicators that capture the relevant cultural, social and economic impacts of mining.
• Encourage and provide assistance for national and industry adoption of CAFF monitoring plans and indicators as minimum standards for the Arctic.
• Help to develop relevant/common questions that could be asked of mining activities across the Arctic.
• Initiate a pilot project(s) that could incorporate elements of data collection and sharing.
• Create an expert group to address data quality and sharing, to consider how groups can work together and how TK might be equitably utilized with a focus on the engagement of TK holders.
• Optimize use of information by ensuring that CAFF data initiatives take into account ongoing mining industry data needs, activities and approaches so that they are clearly defined.

Broadening Research Priorities: Pursuing critical knowledge gaps may bridge both Indigenous and conservation priorities.

a) Conduct Research on Indigenous Knowledge of Wetland Ecosystems,

b) Examine the Intersection of Wetland Biodiversity and Arctic Food Security,

c) Prioritize Species of Conservation and Subsistence Interest.

Monitoring Design and Assessment

• Establish a circumpolar monitoring network based on a hub-and-spoke model in remote areas.
• Increase focus on the response of biotic communities to environmental changes by designing monitoring to address impact hypotheses developed in the CBMP-Freshwater Plan.
• Ensure that the CBMP Freshwater group continues to serve as the focal point for the development and implementation of Arctic, freshwater biodiversity monitoring.
• Provide resources to maintain and build the CBMP freshwater database for future assessments in order to maximize the benefits of this database.
• Efforts should be made to document and preserve data from short-term research projects, research expeditions, industrial, university and government programs and to make these data accessible to the public.
• Status assessments of Arctic lakes and rivers must explore the close association of biodiversity with spatial patterns of physical and chemical quality of aquatic habitats that can drive biological systems.
• CBMP-Freshwater database allows the identification of predominant sampling approaches across the Arctic and should be used to inform the development of harmonized monitoring approaches.
• Where valuable long-term data series exist, these should be given high priority in monitoring programs, to continue to provide data for the detection of long-term trends and changes in biodiversity.

Marine fishes

• Conduct pan-Arctic taxonomic analyses to clarify zoogeographic patterns that are important for detecting and understanding change.
• Establish and conduct a monitoring plan that is independent of fisheries-related programs to assess changes in fish abundance and distributions. Use information from non-commercial fish species caught in groundfish surveys to provide a first step in this direction.
• Use information from TK holders for monitoring marine fishes.
• Connect monitoring initiatives across scales.
• Conduct laboratory studies to examine the possible effects of abiotic and biotic changes (e.g. temperature, salinity, acidity and diseases) on fish species
• Ensure that data on fisheries (commercial as well as artisanal) are accurate and registered in catch databases (such as the Food Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations). Information from logbooks is also relevant as it can be used to estimate the bycatch and the effects of fisheries.

Arthropods : Arthropods are highly diverse and under-studied. They serve as important connections between trophic levels and several are important indicators of changing environments. The START reports on six FECs: pollinators, decomposers, herbivores, prey for vertebrates, blood-feeding insects, and predators and parasitoids. Only a few localized trends are provided due to high variability and lack of monitoring.

• Implement long-term sampling programs at strategic sites with rigorous standardized trapping protocols.
• Collect baseline data, including structured inventories, using standardized protocols for FECs and key attributes.
• Work with Indigenous Knowledge holders, Local Knowledge holders, and/or citizen science to identify regionally important species to monitor, and key locations for long-term monitoring activities.
• Focus monitoring efforts on taxa that: (a) are well-studied with existing data; (b) respond to, or are vulnerable to, change; and/or (c) have possible range shifts. • Monitor dominant habitats at a variety of sites at both small and large geographic scales.
• Monitor relevant microhabitat environmental parameters, in addition to climatological variables, and connect to biological trends at relevant scale.
• Focus on critical FEC attributes, including ecosystem processes such as pollination, decomposition, and herbivory.
• Continue specimen sorting, identification and reporting and construct a complete trait database.
• Complete molecular sequence libraries, increase international collaboration to collate, analyze, archive, and make data accessible.

Ecosystem-based Monitoring and Reporting: Monitoring and reporting should encompass all key taxonomic groups and their likely relationships, linking responses to main biotic and abiotic drivers of change.

• Better coordinate between disciplines and knowledge systems both within and among Arctic states and Indigenous organizations, including experts in abiotic drivers of change (the Arctic Monitoring and Assessment Program) and other monitoring initiatives.
• Promote long-term integrated studies across biomes and taxonomic groups for examining trophic dynamics and other key interactions.
• Improve integration of factors that underpin changes in phenology, demography, and abundance.

Establishment of a system that is acceptable, predictable and measurable for industry, stakeholders and authorities to manage ecological compensation6, taking into account the vulnerability of Arctic nature and the long timeframes and slow pace of renewal associated with cold climates. The process of ecological compensation for unavoidable impacts is based on many assumptions and is inherently uncertain. A primary challenge is predicting with certainty what biodiversity benefits will be gained through the compensatory action (e.g., protection or restoration of another piece of land) and then measuring actual benefits versus predictions. Compensation should be designed and implemented so that the benefits to nature in the compensation area are equal to or higher than the value lost in the affected area. Ideally, that benefit would occur prior to the development action, but practically, that is often not the case.

Government agencies could:

• Facilitate access to land (e.g., assist with agreements to access and ensure long-term protection of compensation sites).
• Develop legal and administrative provisions that allow companies to create compensation areas, ensuring their long-term conservation./li>
• Provide guidelines for monitoring of the effects of the compensation measures carried out and provide data infrastructure to publicly disclose the results to establish a growing knowledge base and create confidence in compensation and trust between the various stakeholders.
• Collaborate with CAFF on developing products described in the “CAFF could” subsection.

Mining industry could:

• Adhere to rigorous scientific standards when designing and implementing compensation measures and present expected results openly and realistically.
• Publicly disclose the design and implementation as well as the monitoring results of compensation actions carried out. This will establish a growing knowledge base and create confidence in compensation and trust between the various stakeholders.
• Collaborate with CAFF on developing products described in the “CAFF could” subsection.

CAFF could:

• Work with mining and other industries and sectors, government agencies and interested stakeholders to evaluate existing and emerging ecological compensation practices and programs and their usefulness in Arctic situations.
• Evaluate systems of measurement and monitoring (e.g., what values should be measured, how should they be measured and when, and how should achieved compensation values such as compensation credits be compared to impacts levels).
• Evaluate existing legislation and guidelines (e.g., what can be done to encourage good ecological compensation practices).
• Consider guidelines and good practices to assist in conserving and increasing biodiversity and ecosystem services through compensation measures.