Global change, including climate change, ecosystem shifts and biodiversity loss as a result of explosive human population growth and consumption, is emerging as one of the most important issues of our time (Vitousek, 1994). Climate change in particular appears to be altering the function, structure and stability of the Earth’s ecosystems (Lovelock, 2009). It has been marked by an 80% increase in atmospheric CO2 level and a °C increase in average global near-surface temperature over the period 1906–2005, with average temperature projected to increase by an additional 1 to 6oC by 2100 (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change [IPCC], 2007)
