27 Prospects of Biodiversity in the Mega-City of Karachi, Pakistan: Potentials, Constraints and Implications Salman Qureshi 1,2 and J¨ urgen H. Breuste 1 1 Department of Geography and Geology, University of Salzburg, Salzburg, Austria 2 Department of Geography, University of Karachi, Karachi, Pakistan Summary The conservation of biodiversity has become an important issue for the management of urban landscapes of mega-cities, more specifically those in pre-industrialized countries. Karachi, which is the business capital of Pakistan, occupies 3530 km 2 . Enormous population growth and a lack of effective planning have produced many ecological problems. The purpose of this chapter is to assess the current state of biodiversity in the city using a conceptual framework that allows the identification of the biodiversity potential of the urban nature system by identifying a variety of urban nature spaces. A multi-scale two-fold method has been designed to assist in the evaluation of these spaces – at the macro and micro scales. The macro-scale classification helps in modeling the general state of nature spaces in the city whereas a specific site-level study allows an analysis of the ecological functions at the micro-scale. Remote sensing has been used to determine and analyse the nature spaces at the city scale. Field surveys complemented the remote sensing results for the micro-level study. The ecological functions of Urban Biodiversity and Design, 1st edition. Edited by N. M ¨ uller, P. Werner and John G. Kelcey.  2010 Blackwell Publishing Ltd