This contributed volume addresses the global scale of urbanization and its impacts on biodiversity. By adding human capital, cities are incubators for new ideas and technologies, creating the possibility for socially and environmentally sensitive growth, but this is rarely seen. Urban ecology, an essential field that supports planning based on environmental perspectives, is a new science in tropical countries. This book discusses the social inequity embedded in tropical cities and explores how this inequity also materializes in biodiversity, with poor neighborhoods of tropical cities lacking sufficient access to green space, and therefore reduced access to the benefits of nature, and poor support for biodiversity. With the current biodiversity crisis, the traditional approach to protecting pristine areas is insufficient. The chapters in this volume illustrate how tropical cities can act as spaces for biological conservation. Ecological literacy can help cities reconcile the needs of both people and of nature.

This book compiles studies by experts from more than 100 institutions and 29 countries on the ecology and biodiversity of tropical cities at multiple scales and applies their studies to urban planning and management. The audience for this book includes researchers, students, and professionals working on environmental, social, economic, cultural, political, architectural, and development projects in urban areas, offering a deep and timely discussion of their influence on the fauna and flora of tropical cities.