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Summary

This script generates the health condition of kelp for each OHI region for the latest year of data. We do this by applying a 2% decrease to kelp globally for 50 years, and calculate the condition based on our extent data.

Updates from previous assessment

This is an entirely new layer for the 2021 assessment!


Data Source

Reference: Wernberg, T., Krumhansl, K., Filbee-Dexter, K., Pedersen, M.F., 2019. Status and Trends for the World’s Kelp Forests, in: World Seas: An Environmental Evaluation. Elsevier, pp. 57–78. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-805052-1.00003-6

Description: “In the past half century, threats to kelp forests have increased in number and severity, leading to a global decline of kelp abundances of ~2% per year.”

Time range: 2019


Methods

Setup

Methods

Calculate a global average condition based on a 2% loss per year.

Paper: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/327606143_Status_and_Trends_for_the_World's_Kelp_Forests#::text=Kelps%20exhibit%20a%20great%20diversity,of%202%25%20per%20year.

Excerpt: “In the past half century, threats to kelp forests have increased in number and severity, leading to a global decline of kelp abundances of ~2% per year.”

To do this, we will calculate the estimated loss based on a 2% loss per year using a compound interest formula and the total global extent we have extracted from this paper.

Any regions that have a negative trend will receive the condition calculated here. Any those that have stable or increasing trends will receive a condition of 1.

## read in extent data

kelp_extent <- read_csv(file.path(dir_git, "data/habitat_extent_kelp.csv"))

sum(kelp_extent$km2) # 1394773 km2 total

## interest rate condition calculation

p = 1394773 # current balance of kelp extent km2 (2020)

r = 0.02 #interest rate (gaining 2% per year, since we are trying to figure out how much extent there would be 50 years ago)

n = 1 #yearly 

t = 50 # 50 years 

p*(1 + (r/n))**(n*t) # 3754154 # This is how much you should gain over 50 years 

## so 50 years ago there would be
3754154 + 1394773 # 5148927 km2 of global extent

## Now lets calculate the decline from 50 years ago extent 

p = 5148927 #initial balance of kelp extent km2 (from 50 years ago, calculated above)

r = -0.02 #interest rate (losing 2% per year)

n = 1 #yearly 

t = 50 # 50 years 

p*(1 + (r/n))**(n*t) # 1875083 # This is how much you should lose over 50 years 


5148927 - 1875083 # 3273844 # this is what would be remaining
 
(3273844)/(5148927) # 0.6358303 condition


## Based on this, we will assign a condition of 0.64 to all countries with a negative trend. 


## read in trend data 

kelp_trend <- read_csv(file.path(dir_git, "data/habitat_trend_kelp.csv"))

## assign conditions
kelp_condition <- kelp_trend %>%
  mutate(health = ifelse(trend < 0, 0.64, 1)) %>%
  dplyr::select(-trend)

kelp_condition_gf <- kelp_condition %>%
  mutate(gap_fill = ifelse(health == 0.64, "global value", "none")) %>%
  dplyr::select(-health)

write.csv(kelp_condition, file.path(dir_git, "data/habitat_health_kelp.csv"), row.names = FALSE)
write.csv(kelp_condition_gf, file.path(dir_git, "data/health_kelp_gf.csv"), row.names = FALSE)