Landscape connectivity as a strategy to mitigate the risk of zoonoses from deforestation and defaunation

Abstract

Currently, human being activities have impaired ecosystem´s resistance capacity to ecological disturbances at global scale. Human impact during the last century has caused an unprecedent rate of transformation of temperate and tropical forest at different scales, mainly due to deforestation. Humanity´s exponential population growth rate and dramatic social inequity represent important challenges for achieving sustainability goals, given increased and uneven use of resources. In addition, land use change increases the population´s risk to be affected by zoonotic emergent disease in tropical and temperate regions, which represents a public held issue. Therefore, landscape connectivity plays a key role not only in biodiversity conservation and maintenance of ecological functions, making the development of tools for land analysis and land use planning. This would allow the restoration of ecosystems, the creation of ecological corridors mainly for the protection of larger wildlife, as well as reducing the potential risk of zoonoses and the development of multidisciplinary studies.