Environment and conservation experts from the University of Nottingham Ningbo China (UNNC) and the University of Nottingham Malaysia (UNMC) are challenging decision-makers, infrastructure planners and conservationists to work together to mitigate the negative impacts of China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and look for opportunities for biodiversity conservagtion.

The correspondence - 'Biodiversity Conservation needs to be a Core Value of China’s Belt and Road Initiative' - has been published in the academic journal Nature Ecology and Evolution. It is authored by Dr Alex Lechner and Dr Ahimsa Campos-Arceiz from the School of Environmental and Geographical Sciences at UNMC (both are members of the Mindset Interdisciplinary Centre for Environmental Studies at UNMC) and Dr Faith Ka Shun Chan from the School of Geographical Sciences, the co-leader of the Belt and Road Initiative Research Priorities Area, Institute of Asia Pacific Studies (IAPS) at UNNC.

The article highlights the potentially disastrous consequences for biodiversity and calls for BRI to put biodiversity conservation at the heart of its core values - not treat it as an after- thought. The authors suggest that BRI could, for instance, implement a network of protected areas and wildlife corridors across Eurasia.