Who is researching biodiversity hotspots in Eastern Europe? A case study on the grasslands in Romania

Abstract

European farmlands are vital arenas for socio-ecological sustainability because of their significant land coverage and potential for integrating food production with biodiversity conservation. The knowledge produced by scientific research is a critical ingredient in developing and implementing socio-economically and ecologically sustainable management strategies for farming landscapes. The grasslands of Europe have been managed for millennia. They have exceptional socio-cultural and economic value and are among the most biodiverse ecosystems in the world. The quality of scientific knowledge on them and its potential to address grasslands as complex socio-ecological systems is strongly dependent not only on the creativity and scientific ambition of the researcher, but also on the network around the researcher (including both academic and non-academic sectors). The goal of this study is to map the research network around Romania’s grasslands using bibliometrics analysis, a well-developed scientific domain that utilizes network theory to analyze relationships between affiliations networks, co-authorship networks, and co-word analysis. The number of studies targeting grasslands in Romania is increasing, owing mostly to international involvement. However, management of the grasslands is still deficient and the contribution of science to the process is virtually absent. The current research is mainly related to the biological and ecological characteristics of grasslands, with topics related to their management notably absent from internationally visible research, especially in the context of EU Common Agricultural Policies. To increase scientific inquiry and better inform the EU and local policies on grasslands management, Romanian researchers should capitalize on international collaborations and local academic leaders. Our findings can be used to identify research gaps and to improve collaboration and knowledge exchange between practitioners, researchers, policy makers, and stakeholders.

Intensive grazing alters the diversity, composition and structure of plant-pollinator interaction networks in Central European grasslands

“…The extremely high stocking rates, continuous grazing throughout the year and lack of consideration for the boundaries of protected areas is likely having catastrophic consequences for the structure and stability of diverse plant-pollinator networks. However, so far, most evidence on the effect of intensive grazing in these regions has been anecdotal or limited to a few groups of species [18,94]. If the diverse landscape of Central and Eastern Europe is to be conserved this knowledge gap needs to be urgently addressed.…”

Limited reciprocal surrogacy of bird and habitat diversity and inconsistencies in their representation in Romanian protected areas

“…Hence, effective conservation also depends on the protection of biodiversity outside of PAs. To do so, the development of incentives for targeted management practices to retain high diversity of species and habitats should be prioritized [93], yet scientific research that can support management decisions is largely lacking [94].…”

A Review of Chinese E-Commerce Research 2001-2020

“…Co-word analysis involves performing statistical analysis on co-words to investigate the internal connections between the literature and academic subject structures. Since its introduction in the 1970s, co-word analysis has been widely used to investigate the research development trends of various academic disciplines, such as environmental crisis management (Dai, Duan, & Zhang, 2020); the evolution of Omega products (Wang et al, 2020); higher education institutions (Vilchez-Roman, Sanguinetti, & Mauricio-Salas, 2020); technology education (Fang, 2016); science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education (Wen, Sun, & Liu, 2020); information ecology (Wang, Guo, Yang, Chen, & Zhang, 2017); and biodiversity (Nita et al, 2019). However, few studies comprising co-word analysis have investigated EC in China.…”