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Tobias Kuemmerle

@tkuemmerle.bsky.social

1.9K followers 490 following 260 posts

Geographer @ Humboldt-University Berlin. | working on land use and its impact on biodiversity

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Environmental science 68%

Geography 17%

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

Gregor Kalinkat @gkalinkat.bsky.social · 22h

Podcast 🎧 von DLF Kultur:

Wissenschaftsfreiheit in Gefahr 🧪

www.deutschlandfunkkultur.de/felsen-in-de...

Hochschulen - Wissenschaftsfreiheit in Gefahr

Immer häufiger werden Wissenschaftler in ihrer Arbeit behindert oder sogar bedroht. Die Entwicklung an der Harvard-Uni zeigt, welche Folgen das haben kann.

www.deutschlandfunkkultur.de

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 2d

Great to have Meredith visit us today! Working with her and Ricardo Torres on the paleoecology of the fantastic #macrauchenia, according to Darwin the `strangest animal ever discovered`!

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

Mongabay @mongabay.com · 2d

Brazil’s antitrust regulator, CADE, decided to suspend the Amazon soy moratorium from Jan. 1, 2026.

Depending on the probe’s course of action, this could dismantle one of the nation’s most important private sector pacts credited with slowing deforestation of the rainforest for soy plantations.

Brazil soy deal that curbs Amazon deforestation to be suspended in 2026

Brazil’s antitrust regulator, CADE, on Sept. 30 decided to suspend the Amazon soy moratorium from Jan. 1, 2026. Depending on the probe’s course of action, this could dismantle one of the nation’s…

news.mongabay.com

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

David Shiffman, Ph.D. 🦈 @whysharksmatter.bsky.social · 2d

UK rejects total ban on bottom trawling in offshore marine protected areas

The U.K. government has rejected calls to fully ban bottom trawling in its offshore marine protected areas, despite evidence that the fishing practice tears up seabed habitats and releases large…

news.mongabay.com

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle, Nathan Richardson

David Shiffman, Ph.D. 🦈 @whysharksmatter.bsky.social · 2d

Shark fact:

Most "great" white sharks are actually mediocre. They're just extremely confident.

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

Germán Orizaola @gorizaola.bsky.social · 3d

"As forests are cut down, butterflies are losing their colours"

With amazing photos by @rgarciaroa.bsky.social, as always, also part of the research team.

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

As forests are cut down, butterflies are losing their colours

The insects’ brilliant hues evolved in lush ecosystems to help them survive. Now they are becoming more muted to adapt to degraded landscapes – and they are not the only things dulling down

www.theguardian.com

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

Biogeography Berlin @biogeoberlin.bsky.social · 3d

Today is #worldhabitatday!
At our Conservation Biogeography Lab at @humboldtuni.bsky.social with @tkuemmerle.bsky.social we research conservation, land-use, human-wildlife conflict of different habitats around the world - and so much more !!
check it out:
biogeo.pages.cms.hu-berlin.de/website/

Conservation Biogeography Lab

Research at the Conservation Biogeography Lab in Berlin

biogeo.pages.cms.hu-berlin.de

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle, Dirk Pilat, Guy Pe’er

Dr. Jonathan Foley @globalecoguy.bsky.social · 5d

Food must be taken seriously as an environmental problem.

It uses ~38% of Earth’s land, drives ~70% of water use, and emits ~22-34% of greenhouse gas pollution globally.

And beef and dairy alone drive a huge proportion of this.

But there are solutions. Lots of them.

go.ted.com/jonathanfoley24

The problem with food and climate — and how to fix it

Global food production — from meat to grains — accounts for a third of all greenhouse gas emissions, says sustainability scientist Jonathan Foley. He presents a portfolio of data-backed solutions to b...

go.ted.com

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

FragDenStaat @fragdenstaat.de · 5d

50 Milliarden zahlt die EU jährlich an Landwirt*innen. Eigentlich soll das Geld Betriebe unterstützen und Lebensmittel bezahlbar machen. Doch unsere internationale Recherche zeigt: Auch Betriebe, die Arbeiter*innen ausbeuten, kassieren weiter Millionen. fragdenstaat.de/artikel/exkl...

EU-Agrarpolitik: Millionen-Zuschüsse für Ausbeuter

Landwirt*innen bekommen viel Geld von der EU, obwohl sie die Rechte ihrer Arbeiter*innen missachten – sogar wenn sie deshalb im Gefängnis sitzen. Weil uns der Zoll entscheidende Informationen nicht ge...

fragdenstaat.de

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle, Erle C. Ellis, Jonathan Lenoir , and 2 more Tobias Kuemmerle, Erle C. Ellis, Jonathan Lenoir, Julie L. Lockwood, Stephen D. Murphy

Markus Eichhorn @markuseichhorn.bsky.social · 7d

Trophic rewilding depends on the assumption that replacing lost megafauna with alternative species can generate similar benefits. This new review by Bescond-Michel et al. challenges that belief. 🌏🌐🧪

Harms of introduced large herbivores outweigh benefits to native biodiversity - Nature Communications

Using impact assessment frameworks, this study shows that the introduction of large mammalian herbivores outside their native range has predominantly caused negative impacts on native biodiversity globally. The authors advise caution regarding their further intentional introduction for conservation purposes.

www.nature.com

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

Rian Nejar 🦋 @riannejar.bsky.social · 8d

Jane Goodall, that some called 'Sister of Mother Earth,' has passed away at 91 [via BBC] 🧪👩‍🔬🦍🐒💂‍♀️

"She was a tireless advocate for the protection and restoration of our natural world."

She was on a speaking tour till the end.

www.bbc.com/news/live/c9...

#JaneGoodall #obituary #champion #nature

Jane Goodall, chimpanzee expert and animal rights campaigner, dies age 91 - follow live

The campaigner, a

www.bbc.com

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Reposted by Elizabeth Saunders, Archon Fung, Tobias Kuemmerle , and 5 more Elizabeth Saunders, Archon Fung, Tobias Kuemmerle, Richard Waite, Rebecca Tushnet, David R. Miller, Carlos Nunes Silva, Michael D. McDonald

Encyclopaedia Britannica @britannica.com · 9d

(solemnly) You've had mail.

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

Terje Helland @terjehelland.bsky.social · 12d

🇬🇪Georgia’s Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) might sound like a graft-busting agency, but under Razhden Kuprashvili it has become a political weapon.
Georgian Dream is using it to wage a repressive crackdown on civil society, silencing NGOs and opposition voices.
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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle, Dirk Pilat, Stephen Ryan

Prof Bill McGuire @profbillmcguire.bsky.social · 12d

"Today, we clear a soccer field’s worth of tropical forest every six seconds, a loss dramatically worsened by humanity’s growing hunger for meat"

Wean ourselves off meat now, or the switch to a Pliocene climate that's locked in will do it for us

www.theguardian.com/environment/...

Meat is a leading emissions source – but few outlets report on it, analysis finds

Sentient Media reveals less than 4% of climate news stories mention animal agriculture as source of carbon emissions

www.theguardian.com

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

UN Environment Programme @unep.org · 12d

Healthy ecosystems & human development can and should go hand in hand.
Policies that balance conservation with community needs, like sustainable fisheries and wildlife management, show us how to thrive while protecting nature.
See how responsible action benefits all: www.unep.org/topics/natur...

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle, Katja Rietzler, Kirstin Drenkhahn

Claudia Kemfert @ckemfert.bsky.social · 13d

900 Mrd. € Schäden drohen bis 2050 – wenn wir nicht handeln. 🚨
Der neue DIW-Wochenbericht zeigt: Jeder investierte Euro in #Klimaschutz bringt 1,8–4,8 € zurück. Handeln ist billiger als Nicht-Handeln!
#Energiewende #DIW #Klimapolitik
www.diw.de/de/diw_01.c....

DIW Berlin: Zwei Jahrzehnte Klimakostenforschung: Präventiver Klimaschutz als volkswirtschaftlicher Vorteil

Zwei Jahrzehnte systematischer Forschung zur volkswirtschaftlichen Bewertung des Klimawandels haben die methodischen Grundlagen für evidenzbasierte Klimapolitik geschaffen. Die zentrale Erkenntnis der...

www.diw.de

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle, Patrick Präg

Sofia Gil-Clavel @sof14g1l.bsky.social · 15d

Are you a social scientist that wants to learn R?

Then, you may find my course "R for Social Scientists" very useful!

I designed this course to give social scientists all that is necessary to start using R in their everyday work.

github.com/SofiaG1l/R_C...

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 16d

This provides further evidence on how the expansion of commodity agriculture marginalizes forest-dependent people. More here: www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/... and here www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...

More on our project #SystemShift, where we study land-use change in dry forests: hu.berlin/SystemShift

Revealing land control dynamics in emerging agricultural frontiers | PNAS

The expansion of commodity agriculture into tropical and subtropical woodlands degrades ecosystem functionality, biodiversity, and the livelihood b...

www.pnas.org

Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 16d

Integrating this with datasets on land-use change (from @matthiasbaumann.bsky.social - iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1...) allowed us to estimate forest loss in these footprints:

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 16d

This analysis started with a comprehensive mapping of the area used by Indigenous communities for different activities - better quantifying the resource footprints of these communities is in itself an important outcome of this work:

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 16d

Using participatory mapping and satellite-based analyses, we show that 400 Indigenous communities in the Argentine Chaco
- lost on average 21% of the forests they use
- saw a decline of up to 35% in ecosystem service provisioning
- face increasing restrictions in terms of accessing resources

Photo showing deforestation. Source: https://www.business-humanrights.org/de/neuste-meldungen/argentina-environmentalists-warn-that-the-gran-chaco-forest-is-being-devastated-by-logging-and-soybean-farming-indigenous-families-are-also-being-displaced/

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 16d

Major erosion of the resource base of Indigenous communities in the Gran Chaco due to expanding agribusinesses

New paper out in @ambio-journal.bsky.social, led by @maria-vallejos.bsky.social 👉 link.springer.com/article/10.1... @biogeoberlin.bsky.social @humboldtuni.bsky.social @erc.europa.eu

Impacts of agricultural expansion on the resource availability of forest-dependent Indigenous communities in the Dry Chaco - Ambio

Agricultural expansion into tropical and subtropical forests threatens forest-dependent communities by disrupting their access to vital resources. We explored these impacts for over 400 Indigenous com...

link.springer.com

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 21d

You can be critical - but be nice and friendly. How hard can it be?

www.nature.com/articles/d41...

‘Lipstick on a pig’: how to fight back against a peer-review bully

Scientific societies, journals, editors and researchers are pushing back against mean-spirited peer reviews.

www.nature.com

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 21d

This work, using a bottom-up approach based on interviews, nicely complements actor typologies derived using top-down approaches, such as in our land system typology here: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti... #GranChaco #SystemShift

An actor-centered, scalable land system typology for addressing biodiversity loss in the world’s tropical dry woodlands

Land use is a key driver of the ongoing biodiversity crisis and therefore also a major opportunity for its mitigation. However, appropriately consider…

www.sciencedirect.com

Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 21d

Using a rich interview survey, we derive five key types of land-use agents in the Chaco, based on their capital assets, land management activities and personal characteristics. All these dimensions were important to not lump actors together (and thus oversimplify)! #archetyping

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 21d

Putting medium-sized farmers on the map to move beyond the agribusiness vs. smallholder dichotomy. New paper led by Melina Faingerch & Matias Mastrangelo out in Ecology & Society identifying key groups of land-use actors in the Chaco 👉 ecologyandsociety.org/vol30/iss3/a... @biogeoberlin.bsky.social

Ecology & Society: Capturing the multidimensionality of land-use agents in a deforestation hotspot

Given increasing recognition that strategies to transition to sustainable land use should be context specific, structuring the diversity of land-use agents is important. This is particularly so for th...

ecologyandsociety.org

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

Biogeography Berlin @biogeoberlin.bsky.social · 22d

Quantifying the impacts of agricultural expansion on the livelihoods of Indigenous communities in #DryChaco.
New paper out by @maria-vallejos.bsky.social, Ana Laura Álvarez, @o-delgiorgio.bsky.social & @tkuemmerle.bsky.social in AMBIO!

link.springer.com/article/10.1...

#newpaper #biogeography

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 27d

Will tropical dry forests survive the next 50 years?

news.mongabay.com/2025/06/will...

Will tropical dry forests survive the next 50 years?

In 1978, renowned ecologist Dan Janzen jumped into a ravine in Costa Rica, broke three ribs, and spent the first month of the rainy season watching the tropical dry forest from inside a shack. At nigh...

news.mongabay.com

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Tobias Kuemmerle @tkuemmerle.bsky.social · 27d

Bolivia must prioritize biodiversity | Science www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...

Bolivia must prioritize biodiversity

www.science.org

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Reposted by Tobias Kuemmerle

Alan McElligott @amcell.bsky.social · 28d

2025. Hundreds of suspicious journals flagged by AI screening tool. System that searches for signs of bad practice could help to weed out questionable titles. www.nature.com/articles/d41...

Hundreds of suspicious journals flagged by AI screening tool

System that searches for signs of bad practice could help to weed out questionable titles.

www.nature.com

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