Influence of the biodiversity of ecosystems and their anthropogenic changes on vector-borne diseases of plants, animals and humans in Guadeloupe - INSULA

Issues 

The outermost regions  (ORs) and the overseas countries and territories (OCTs) account for 80 % of European biodiversity, most of which is concentrated in the tropics. The biodiversity of their ecosystems is collapsing at an alarming rate. The tropical European territories are also hotspots for the emergence of vector-borne diseases (VBDs), which are the cause of increasingly frequent epidemics in these territories. It is still unclear whether changes in the biodiversity in the ORs and OCTs have a positive or negative impact on the emergence of VBDs, which prevents the implementation of appropriate conservation strategies that could contribute to limiting these outbreaks.

Description

The INSULA project brings together a consortium of partners from Guadeloupe (CIRAD, IPG, INRAE, UA) and Belgium (UCLouvain) with recognised and complementary expertise in animal, human and plant health, ecology, metagenomics and mathematical modelling.

To reach its objectives, the consortium implements a “One Health” approach in order to:

• Define and compare the biodiversity of ecosystems in degraded and preserved biotopes in Guadeloupe
• Characterise the VBDs present in these biotopes using complementary high-throughput screening and targeted approaches
• Assess the impact of biodiversity and ecosystem degradation in Guadeloupe on the transmission of VBDs

Expected changes

• An inventory of the biodiversity of mangrove, swamp forests and terra firme forest ecosystems in Guadeloupe
• Quantification of the health impacts of changes in ecosystem biodiversity in Guadeloupe
• Recommendations for biodiversity management to limit the risks of VBD outbreaks in Guadeloupe and other tropical ORs and OCTs.