Development corridors are extensive, often transnational and linear, geographical areas targeted for investment to help achieve sustainable development. They often comprise the creation of hard infrastructure (i.e. physical structures) and soft infrastructure (i.e. policies, plans, and programmes) involving a variety of actors. They are globally widespread, and likely to be a significant driver of habitat loss. Here, we describe the development corridors phenomenon from a biodiversity perspective and identify the elements of best practice in biodiversity impact mitigation. We use these to carry out a review of the peer reviewed literature on corridors to respond to three questions: i) how impacts on biodiversity and ecosystem services are assessed; ii) what mitigation measures are discussed to manage these impacts; and iii) to what extent do these measures approximate to best practice. We found that of 271 publications on development corridors across all continents (except for Antarctica) mentioning biodiversity or ecosystem services, only 100 (37%) assessed impacts on biodiversity and 7 (3%) on ecosystem services. Importantly, only half of these (52, 19% of the total 271 articles) discussed mitigation measures to manage these impacts. These measures focused on avoidance and minimisation and there was scant mention of restoration or ecological compensation illustrating a deficient application of the mitigation hierarchy. We conclude that the academic literature on corridors does not give sufficient consideration to comprehensive mitigation of biodiversity impacts. To change this, impact assessment research needs to acknowledge the complexity of such multi-project and multi-stakeholder initiatives, quantify biodiversity losses due to the full suite of their potential direct, indirect and cumulative impacts, and follow all the steps of the mitigation hierarchy impact framework. We suggest a series of research avenues and policy recommendations to improve impact assessments of corridors towards achieving better biodiversity outcomes.

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减轻发展走廊对生物多样性的影响：全球审查

发展走廊是广泛的、通常是跨国和线性的地理区域，旨在投资以帮助实现可持续发展。它们通常包括涉及各种参与者的硬基础设施（即物理结构）和软基础设施（即政策、计划和项目）的创建。它们在全球范围内广泛存在，可能是栖息地丧失的重要驱动因素。在这里，我们从生物多样性的角度描述了发展走廊现象，并确定了减轻生物多样性影响的最佳实践要素。我们使用这些对走廊的同行评审文献进行审查，以回答三个问题：i) 如何评估对生物多样性和生态系统服务的影响；ii) 讨论了哪些缓解措施来管理这些影响；iii) 这些措施在多大程度上接近最佳实践。我们发现，在所有大陆（南极洲除外）发展走廊的 271 篇出版物中，提到生物多样性或生态系统服务，只有 100 篇 (37%) 评估了对生物多样性的影响，7 篇 (3%) 评估了对生态系统服务的影响。重要的是，其中只有一半（52 篇，占 271 篇文章总数的 19%）讨论了管理这些影响的缓解措施。这些措施侧重于避免和最小化，很少提及恢复或生态补偿，说明缓解等级的应用不足。我们得出结论，关于走廊的学术文献没有充分考虑全面缓解生物多样性影响。为了改变这一点，影响评估研究需要承认此类多项目和多利益相关方举措的复杂性，量化由于其全套潜在直接、间接和累积影响而造成的生物多样性损失，并遵循缓解等级影响框架的所有步骤。我们提出了一系列研究途径和政策建议，以改进走廊的影响评估，以实现更好的生物多样性成果。