From conservation theory to practice: crossing the dividecommunicate information about wildlife, wildlife products, and legal concerns pertaining to wildlife of Iraq and Afghanistan

CHAP T E R 1 5

From conservation theory to practice:crossing the divideMadhu Rao and Joshua Ginsberg

Conservation biology is continually developingnew tools and concepts that contribute to ourunderstanding of populations, species and eco-systems (Chapter 1). The science underpinningthe field has undoubtedlymade rapid strides gen-erating more effective methods to document bio-diversity, monitor species and habitats. Scientistshave developed comprehensive priority settingexercises to help determine where and what toconserve in on-going attempts to identify whichfactors would best serve as the basis for triage forspecies and ecosystems (Wilson et al. 2007; Chap-ter 11). They arewell positioned to track the loss ofspecies and ecosystems in broad patterns even ifprecise details are not always available (Chapter10). However applying the science effectively re-quires the efforts of conservation biologists com-bined with a diversity of other actors, most ofwhom are non-biologists and include local andindigenous communities, civil servants at all le-vels of government, environmental consultants,park managers, environmental lobbyists, privateindustry, and even themilitary (Box 15.1; Chapter14). This amorphous group of practitioners willpursue a diverse set of activities which includeputting up or taking down fences (literal and me-taphorical), lobbying politicians, buying land, ne-gotiating with members of local and indigenouscommunities, tackling invasive species problems,guarding against poachers andmanaging off-takeof plants and animals.

There are many pressing challenges facingpractical conservation. Forces affecting biodiver-sity in different ecosystems have altered over thepast two decades. For instance, the nature oftropical forest destruction has changed from

being dominated by rural farmers to currentlybeing driven substantially by major industriesand economic globalization, with timber opera-tions, oil and gas development, large-scale farm-ing and exotic-tree plantations being the mostfrequent causes of forest loss (see Chapter 4).A direct result of these changes is the need forengaging not just conservation minded indivi-duals and organizations, but those in the largest,and most influential, of the world’s corporationsand multilateral institutions (Box 15.2). In addi-tion, the changes in those factors driving loss–and in the scale of loss – requires that we diversifyour approaches, and focus not just on biodiversi-ty, but on the whole issue of those goods andservices that natural systems provide for us(Daily 1997, Woodwell 2002; Box 15.3). Globalthreats, and opportunities, such as climatechange (Chapter 8), are forcing conservationpractitioners to work at a variety of scales tobetter integrate these challenges (Bonan 2008).Conservation science must meet the continuallychanging nature of threats to biodiversity (Butlerand Laurance 2008); conservation biologistsand practitioners need to design and leveragesolutions in response to these global changes inthreat.

Not only is the practice of conservation gettingmore complicated, but it has a stronger globalpresence, and increasingly large expenditures(Cobb et al. 2007). As a result, implementingagencies and specifically conservation organiza-tions are being held to a higher standard in mon-itoring and evaluating their conservation success,and failure (Wells et al. 1999; Ferraro and Patta-nayak 2006; see also Box 15.4). Another issue that

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Box 15.1 Swords into ploughshares: reducing military demand for wildlife productsLisa Hickey, Heidi Kretser, Elizabeth Bennett, and McKenzie Johnson

Illegal trade in wild animals and plants is one ofthe greatest threats to populations of manyspecies. The impacts are diverse, and the directimpact in reducing wildlife populations is wellstudied, and often noted (Robinson andBennett 2000; Bennett 2005). Indirect effects –including the global movement of emerginginfectious diseases (Karesh et al. 2005) pose adifferent, but equally compelling case for bettermanagement of such trade. The economicimperatives are great as well, with currentestimates of the value of illicit trade (estimatedat US$6 billion; Warchol 2004) second only tonarcotics and arms trafficking. Legal trade isclearly occurring at a much higher level (on theorder of US$150 billion per year) if trade incommodities such as timber and ocean fish areincluded in these studies (Warchol 2004), butthis also produces a significant threat since legaltrade in many species is unsustainable.US military personnel have a long‐term

presence abroad, including in countries of greatbiodiversity importance. These personnel andaffiliates have significant buying power thatinfluences local markets, including the ability todrive the demand for wildlife products. TheAfghanistan Biodiversity Project funded byUSAID (United States Agency for InternationalDevelopment) and implemented by theWildlifeConservation Society (WCS) has found that USsoldiers serving in Afghanistan are primarybuyers of illegal wildlife products there,including big cat skins and other types oftrophies. WCS has initiated a program focusedon education and awareness‐raising to reducepurchasing of wildlife products by the USmilitary, and protect American soldiers fromserious penalties related to the import of illegalwildlife. WCS, in conjunction with theDepartment of State, traveled to Bagram AirBase, the largest military base in Afghanistan, toeducate soldiers on issues related to illegal tradein wild species. Military Police (MPs) receivedinstruction on issues of biodiversity inAfghanistan andhow to identify threatened andendangered Afghan species. The partnershipbetween Bagramcustoms officials andWCS aimsto reduce illegal buying of wildlife products bysoldiers, and MPs have already shown an adept

ability to identify and seize prohibited wildspecies before they leave the base, as well asenthusiasm to collaborate on the program.

To further address the demand for wildlifeproducts by US military personnel, WCS iscomplementing its work in Afghanistan byworking with the military in the US. As part ofthis effort WCS ran a booth at Safety Day, inFort Drum, to raise awareness about illegalwildlife trade for both pre and post‐deployment troops. A survey conducted at FortDrum as part of this effort indicated that fewerthan 12% of soldiers (n = 371) had heard ofCITES, yet more than 40% had either purchasedwildlife products while overseas or seen othermembers of the military purchase these items(Kretser, unpublished data).

To increase its effectiveness in working onwildlife trade issues with the military, WCS isplanning to develop a template approach tobegin addressing wildlife trade within allbranches of the military. Activities include thedevelopment of pocket cards and playingcards for soldiers as well as handouts andpower point slides for incorporation intomilitary‐run environmental training includingofficer training, pre‐departure briefings, andin‐theater briefings. The playing cards willcommunicate information about wildlife,wildlife products, and legal concernspertaining to wildlife of Iraq andAfghanistan.

REFERENCES

Bennett, E. L. (2005). Consuming wildlife in the tropics. InS. Guynup, ed. State of the Wild 2006: a global portraitof wildlife, wildlands, and oceans, pp. 106–113. IslandPress, Washington, DC.

Karesh, W. B., Cook, R. A., Bennett, E. L., and Newcomb, J.(2005). Wildlife trade and global disease emergence.Emerging Infectious Diseases, 11, 1000–1002.

Robinson, J. G. and Bennett, E. L., eds (2000). Hunting forsustainability in tropical forests. Columbia UniversityPress, New York, NY.

Warchol, G. L. (2004). The Transnational Illegal WildlifeTrade. Criminal Justice Studies, 17, 57–73.

FROM CONSERVATION THEORY TO PRACTICE: CROSSING THE DIVIDE 285

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Box 15.2 The World Bank and biodiversity conservationTony Whitten

The World Bank is well known as adevelopment agency providing bothconcessionary credits and commercial‐rateloans to governments to reduce poverty, but isless well known as a leader in biodiversityconservation. In fact, the biodiversity portfoliohas grown steadily, especially since 1992 whenfunding from the Global Environment Facility(GEF) became available. In the last ten years theWorld Bank approved 598 projects that fully orpartially supported biodiversity conservationand sustainable use (see Box 15.2 Figure). Theseare being executed in 122 countries andthrough 52 multi‐country efforts and includeactivities in almost all terrestrial and coastalhabitats, although more than half of allprojects are directed towards the conservationof different types of forests. Many of thesehabitats provide critical ecosystem services andcan be an important buffer to climate change,providing low‐cost options for adaptation andmitigation actions. During the last 20 years, theWorld Bank has committed almost US$3.5billion in loans and GEF resources, andleveraged US$2.7 billion in co‐financing,resulting in a total investment portfolio forbiodiversity exceeding US$6 billion. Protected‐area projects account for more than half of theinvestments, but the Bank is increasinglyseeking to mainstream biodiversity inproduction landscapes, especially where GEF‐funded activities can be integrated within Banklending.Partner governments have borrowed just

over 31% of the US$6 billion, whereas grantscomprise 25%, mostly facilitated throughBank‐executed GEF projects, as well as throughtrust funds, and carbon financing. Theremaining 44% represents co‐financing andparallel financing, and global initiatives, suchas the IFC Small and Medium Enterprise Fund,the Critical Ecosystems Partnership Fund, CoralReef Targeted Research, and projects fundedunder the World Bank‐NetherlandsPartnership Program’s Forests and Biodiversitywindows.

Box 15.2 Figure These villagers on Buton, Sulawesi (Indonesia),are members of a cooperative within a village which has developed aconservation agreement vowing not to encroach into the naturalforest and not to hunt wildlife, with sanctions for members who goagainst the agreement. In return they get access to high prices fortheir cashews (Anacardium sp.) which became the world’s firstFairtrade cashews. This World Bank project is executed by OperationWallacea ‐ see www.opwall.com and www.lambusango.com.

The scale and variety of Bank financingmechanisms provide many opportunities tointegrate biodiversity concerns intodevelopment assistance, to address the rootcauses of biodiversity loss, and to develop localcapacity and interest. The Bank’s leadershipand coordinating role within the donorcommunity can help to promote biodiversityconservation within national sustainabledevelopment agendas. As well as being a majorfunding source for biodiversity projects indeveloping countries, the Bank is also a sourceof technical knowledge and expertise, and hasthe convening power to facilitate participatorydialogue between governments and otherrelevant stakeholders.In addition to the biodiversity projects

themselves, each and every World Bank projectis subjected to a ‘safeguard review’ to ensurethat they meet the requirements of the variouspolicies it has on, for example, environmentalassessment, resettlement, indigenous peoples,international waterways, physical cultural

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286 CONSERVATION BIOLOGY FOR ALL



is increasingly taking the forefront in the applica-tion of conservation science to conservation prac-tice is the often real, and sometimes, perceived,conflicting mandates of biodiversity conservationand poverty alleviation. While there are, clearly,situations in which development can facilitateconservation efforts, it cannot be assumed thateconomic development will automatically leadto conservation benefits (Redford and Sanderson2003). Furthermore, we cannot impose theworld’s development needs on the relativelysmall (approximately 10%) part of the land sur-face that constitutes protected areas and doing soposes significant, and perhaps insurmountable,challenges to the effective management of theseareas to achieve global biodiversity goals. Thevalue of protected areas – and their costs to localand indigenous people – has often been framed asone of opposition – with protected areas seen bysome as depriving local and indigenous peoplesof resources, by others as potentially beneficial(Sodhi et al. 2008). As one would expect, the reali-ty is that such relationships are complex, andoften locally specific (Upton et al. 2008) and theproblem is more subtle (see for instance West andBrockington (2006) for a more detailed discussionof some of the effects). That parks may actuallybenefit the rural poor and serve as an attractantwith human growth at their boundaries is both an

argument for such areas, and flags a concern fortheir future conservation. The much contestedrelationship between parks and people will con-tinue to stimulate both better analysis of the real-ity of such conflict, and provoke the design ofinnovative approaches for reconciliation betweenhuman needs and biodiversity conservation(Sodhi et al. 2006).

The technical and financial capacity for biodi-versity conservation is significantly limited in de-veloping economies harboring high levels ofbiodiversity (for example, most tropicalcountries). Such human resource deficits havebeen at the root of the changes in the way thatconservation NGOs (Non-governmental Organi-zations), local governments, and internationaldonors have implemented conservation projectsover the last four decades (Cobb et al. 2007).Effectively tackling this issue – and empoweringboth local and national governments and institu-tions – will require visionary and far-sightedapproaches that are able to justify investment ofscarce resources to long-term capacity buildingobjectives in the face of immediate conservationproblems.

The gap between conservation science and itsapplication has been long acknowledged (Balm-ford et al. 1998) and there are numerous effortsdirected at bridging it (Sutherland et al. 2004).

Box 15.2 (Continued)

property – and natural habitats (World Bank1998). The last of these is an important tool bywhich biodiversity concerns are integrated intoimproved project design because the policyforbids the Bank supporting projects involvingthe significant conversion of natural habitatsunless there are no feasible alternatives for theproject and its sites, and unless comprehensiveanalysis demonstrates that overall benefitsfrom the project outweigh the environmentalcosts. Likewise the Bank will not approve aproject that would involve the significantconversion or degradation of a gazetted orapproved protected area. Mitigation foranticipated project impacts on biodiversity

might include conservation offsets oradditional species protection.For further information and details of

projects, see Mackinnon et al. (2008) andwww.worldbank.org/biodiversity.

REFERENCES

Mackinnon, K., Sobrevila, C. and Hickey, V. (2008).Biodiversity, climate change,and adaptation: nature‐based solutions from the World Bank portfolio. TheWorld Bank, Washington, DC.

World Bank (1998). Operational Policy 4.04: naturalhabitats. The World Bank, Washington, DC.


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Box 15.3 The Natural Capital ProjectHeather Tallis, Joshua H. Goldstein, and Gretchen C. Daily

The vision of the Millennium EcosystemAssessment is a world in which people andinstitutions appreciate natural systems and thebiodiversity that constitutes their principalworking parts as vital assets, recognize thecentral roles these assets play in supportinghuman well‐being, and routinely incorporatetheir material and intangible values intodecision‐making. This vision has now caughtfire, fueled by innovations worldwide – frompioneering local leaders to the belly ofgovernment bureaucracy, and from traditionalcultures to a new experimental wing ofGoldman Sachs – a giant investment bankingfirm (Daily and Ellison 2002; Bhagwat andRutte 2006; Kareiva and Marvier 2007; Ostrom2007; Goldman et al. 2008). China, forinstance, is investing over 700 billion yuan inecosystem service payments over 1998–2010(in early 2009, US$ 1.0 = 6.85 yuan) (Liu et al.2008).The aim of the Natural Capital Project is to

act on this vision and mainstream ecosystemservices into everyday decisions around theworld. Launched in October 2006, the Projectis a unique partnership among StanfordUniversity, The Nature Conservancy, andWorld Wildlife Fund, working together withmany other institutions (www.naturalcapitalproject.org). Its core mission is toalign economic forces with conservation by: (i)developing tools that make incorporatingnatural capital into decisions easy; (ii)demonstrating the power of these tools inimportant, contrasting places; and (iii)engaging leaders globally.Making conservation mainstream requires

turning the valuation of ecosystem services intoeffective policy and finance mechanisms – aproblem no one has solved on a large scale.A key challenge remains that, relative to otherforms of capital, assets embodied in ecosystemsare often poorly understood, scarcelymonitored, typically undervalued, andundergoing rapid degradation (Daily et al.2000; Heal 2000; Balmford et al. 2002; MEA2003; NRC 2005; Mäler et al. 2008). Often theimportance of ecosystem services is recognized

only upon their loss, such as in the wake ofHurricane Katrina (Chambers et al. 2007).To help address this challenge, we have

developed a software system for integratedvaluation of ecosystem services and tradeoffs(InVEST; Nelson et al. 2009). This tool informsmanagers and policy makers about the impactsof alternative resource management choices onthe economy, human well‐being and theenvironment, in an integrated way.Examples of urgent questions that InVEST

can help answer include:

• Which parts of a landscape provide thegreatest carbon sequestration, biodiversity,and tourism values?• Where would reforestation achieve thegreatest downstream water quality benefits?• How would agricultural expansion, climatechange and population growth affect a down-streamcity’s drinkingwater supply orflood risk?

InVEST is designed for use as part of an activedecision‐making process. The first phase of theapproach involves working with decisionmakers and other stakeholders to identifycritical management decisions and to developscenarios to project how the provision ofservices might change in response to thosedecisions as well as to changing climate orpopulation. Basedon these scenarios, amodularset of models quantifies and maps ecosystemservices in a flexible way. The outputs of thesemodels provide decision makers with maps andother information about costs, benefits,tradeoffs, and synergies of alternativeinvestments in ecosystem service provision.InVEST is now being used inmajor resource

decisions in Bolivia, Brazil, China, Colombia,Ecuador, Mexico, Peru, Tanzania, and the UnitedStates (California, Hawaii, Oregon, andWashington; see Box 15.3 Figure). The tool hasproven useful with stakeholders as diverse asnational governments, private landowners andcorporations, and increasing demand for the toolindicates that the time is ripe for ecosystemservice thinking to change the face ofmanagement across sectors and around theglobe.

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LULC Categories

Biofuels Scenario: Sugarcane Ethanol

Change from CurrentLandscape

Carbon Storage (tC/ha) Water Quality (relative score)

Current Landscape

(A) Land Use / Land Cover Maps

(B) Changes in Ecosystem Service Provision

Agriculture

Exotic grasses, shrubs, forest

Developed

Island of O’ahu

Native shrublands and forest

Sugarcane (for scenario)

Decrease

No Change

Increase

Box 15.3 Figure Application of InVEST to a planning region on the Island of O'ahu, Hawaii. The parcel covers approximately 10 500 ha frommountaintop to the sea, including 800 ha of developed rural community lands along the coast, 3600 ha of agricultural lands further inland, and6100 ha of rugged forested lands in the upper part of the watershed. While many of the agricultural fields have been fallow for over a decade,stakeholders are exploring using the fields to grow sugarcane for ethanol biofuel (among other options). InVEST was used to assess how thisland‐use change scenario would affect the ecosystem services of water quality and carbon storage. Part (A) shows land use/land cover (LULC)maps for the current landscape and the sugarcane ethanol scenario. Part (B) shows the projected changes for water quality and carbon stock.The dominant effect is a decrease in service provision relative to the current landscape. Water quality decreases by 44.2%, driven by increasedfertilizer application on the fallow fields returned to crop production. Taking advantage of next‐generation sugarcane breeds, however, couldgreatly reduce these impacts. Carbon stock decreases by 12.6%, which is due to clearing of woody exotic species that grew while the fields werenot in production. This “carbon debt” (Fargione et al. 2008) could be repaid through time by using sugarcane ethanol to offset more carbonintensive fuel sources. The information generated from this InVEST analysis elucidates ecosystem service tradeoffs apparent in undertakingbiofuel production, which can inform land use decisions alongside economic and other benefits not shown here. Furthermore, the analysis helpsland managers identify where to focus efforts, spatially for each ecosystem service, to improve management practices. See also Figure 3.1.

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These efforts are based on the assumption thateffective conservation is dependent not only onscience catching up with the dynamic aspects of achanging world (Chapter 13) but also on conser-vation practice catching up with science (Presseyet al. 2007). There is a recognized need to integratethe activities of conservation biologists (and otherconservation minded scientists) with those ofpractitioners, with conservation biologists inter-acting more frequently with practitioners and thelatter better documenting their actions (Suther-land et al. 2004). This chapter provides a glimpseinto the realm of practical conservation with ex-amples and case studies to illustrate some of thediverse approaches that are being implementedto conserve biodiversity and how these ap-

proaches benefit from, and offer opportunitiesto, the science that underlies them.

15.1 Integration of Science andConservation Implementation

A good example of integrating conservation sci-ence with implementation is a project that isbeing undertaken in South Africa (Balmford2003). Richard Cowling and his colleagues havesuccessfully attempted to build the input of deci-sion-makers and local people into scientificallyrigorous conservation planning for the Cape Flo-ristic Region in South Africa (Cowling andPressey 2003; Cowling et al. 2003; Pressey et al.


REFERENCES

Balmford, A., Bruner, A., Cooper, P., et al. (2002). Eco-nomic reasons for conserving wild nature. Science, 297,950–953.

Bhagwat, S. A. and Rutte, C. (2006). Sacred groves:potential for biodiversity management Frontiers inEcology and the Environment, 4, 519–524.

Chambers, J. Q., Fisher, J. I., Zeng, H., et al. (2007).Hurricane Katrina’s carbon footprint on U.S. Gulf Coastforests. Science, 318, 1107.

Daily, G. C. and Ellison, K. (2002). The new economy ofnature: the quest to make conservation profitable. IslandPress, Washington, DC.

Daily, G. C., Söderqvist, T., Aniyar, S., et al. (2000). Thevalue of nature and the nature of value. Science, 289,395–396.

Fargione, J., Hill, J., Tilman, D., Polasky, S., and Hawthorne,P. (2008). Land clearing and the biofuel carbon debt.Science, 319, 1235–1238.

Goldman, R. L., Tallis, H., Kareiva, P., and Daily, G. C.(2008). Field evidence that ecosystem service projectssupport biodiversity and diversify options. Proceedingsof the National Academy of Sciences of the UnitedStates of America, 105, 9445–9448.

Heal, G. (2000). Nature and the marketplace: capturingthe value of ecosystem services. Island Press,Washington, DC.

Kareiva, P. and Marvier, M. (2007). Conservation for thepeople. Scientific American, 297, 50–57.

Liu, J., Li, S., Ouyang, Z., et al. (2008). Ecological andsocioeconomic effects of China’s policies for ecosystemservices. Proceedings of the National Academy ofSciences of the United States of America, 105,9489–9494.

MEA (millennium Ecosystem Assessment). (2003).Ecosystems and human well‐being: a framework forassessment. Island Press, Washington, DC.

Mäler, K‐G., Aniyar, S., and Jansson, Å. (2008). Accountingfor ecosystem services as a way to understand therequirements for sustainable development. Proceedingsof the National Academy of Sciences of the UnitedStates of America, 105, 9501–9506.

Nelson, E., Mendoza, G., Regetz, J., et al. (2009). Modelingmultiple ecosystem services, biodiversity conservation,commodity production, and tradeoffs at landscapescales. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment, 7,4–11.

NRC (National Research Council). (2005). Valuingecosystem services: toward better environmentaldecision‐making. National Academies Press, Washing-ton, DC.

Ostrom, E. (2007). A diagnostic approach for goingbeyond panceas. Proceedings of the National Academyof Sciences of the United States of America, 104,15181–15187.




Box 15.4 Measuring the effectiveness of conservation spendingMatthew Linkie and Robert J. Smith

Conservationists can only develop cost‐effective strategies by evaluating the success oftheir past efforts. However, few programsmeasure project performance adequately: mostcarry out no assessment at all or rely ondescriptive analyses that cannot distinguishbetween the confounding effects of differentcovariates. In response, Ferraro and Pattanayak(2006) have presented a counterfactual designfor determining conservation success. Thisinvolves comparing similar sampling units, e.g.villages, people or forest patches, which receiveconservation intervention (the treatmentgroup) with those that do not (the controlgroup). Here, we describe two studies that haveused this approach to evaluate conservationeffectiveness.

Case study 1

Linkie et al. (2008) studied a US$19 millionproject that ran from 1997–2002 in and aroundKerinci Seblat National Park, Sumatra. Part ofthis project involved spending US$1.5 millionon development schemes within 65 villages(the treatment) that border the park, in returnfor the villagers signing agreements to stop theillegal clearance of their forest (see Box 15.4Figure). Thus, determining the success of thisstrategy involved measuring subsequent vil-lage deforestation rates. However, deforesta-tion patterns are often explained by covariatesrelating to accessibility, such as proximity toroads, and some project villages were chosenfor logistical or political reasons. Linkie et al.accounted for the influence of these differentfactors by using a propensity score matchingtechnique. This approach used data on tensocio‐economic and biophysical covariatesfrom a village profile dataset to identify thefactors that best predicted forest loss, and toidentify the 65 non‐project villages (the con-trol) that most closely matched the projectvillages in terms of these factors. Deforestationrates between these two groups were then

compared and no difference was found, show-ing that project participation had no effect. Incontrast, a questionnaire survey conducted bythe project found stronger conservationsupport in project villages than non‐projectvillages, and on this basis alone the projectmight have been considered a success.

Box 15.4 Figure Small scale logging in Sumatra (Indonesia).Photograph by Jeremy Holden.

Case study 2

Andam et al. (2008) evaluated the effective-ness of protected areas (PAs) in avoidingdeforestation in Costa Rica. They also used apropensity score matching technique to identi-fy similar unprotected areas (the control) thatmost closely matched the PAs (the treatment),based on similarities of accessibility and landuse opportunities. From 1960–1997, the PAswere found to avoid about 10% of thedeforestation that was predicted to haveoccurred if they had not been present. Inaddition, Andam et al. tested a commonlyused method for evaluating PA effectiveness,which compares deforestation in PAs againstthat in adjacent unprotected areas. Suchcomparisons can be problematic because PAstend to be located on land that is less

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2007). The Cape Floristic Region, covering 90 000km2 of the south-west tip of Africa, contains over9000 species of plants and is globally recognizedfor its biological significance (Davis et al. 1994;Olson and Dinerstein 1998; Stattersfield et al.1998; Myers et al. 2000). Over 1400 of the plantspecies found here are Red Data Book listed andnearly 70% are endemic to the region. Conversionto intensive agriculture, forestry, urbanization,infestation with alien plants and widespreadgrazing are key threats in the region with 22%of all land protected in conservation areas (onlyhalf in statutory reserves) and 75% in privateownership (Balmford 2003).

Against this backdrop of escalating threats, de-clining institutional capacity, and a biologicallyunrepresentative reserve system, a project knownas the Cape Action Plan for the Environment(CAPE) was launched (Cowling and Pressey2003). The project has since expanded into a 20-year implementation program addressing threebroad themes: (i) the protection of biodiversityin priority areas; (ii) the promotion of its sustain-able use; and (iii) the strengthening of local insti-tutions and capacity. From its inception, theproject engaged not only the statutory agenciesthat would ultimately be responsible for imple-

mentation, but also land-owners, local commu-nities and the non-governmental sector. Buildingthese partnerships early on enabled a diversity oflocal actors and external practitioners to workwith planners in developing broad project goalsand strategies. The approach of integrating theinvolvement of stakeholders and practitionerswith scientifically rigorous planning not onlyearned the project credibility with external do-nors but the resulting wide ownership of theconservation plan has been crucial to its ongoingimplementation (Balmford 2003).

15.2 Looking beyond protected areas

During the past century, the standard practice forsafeguarding biodiversity (Chapter 2) and reduc-ing the rate of biodiversity loss has been the es-tablishment of protected areas (Lovejoy 2006).The steady and significant increase in the areaprotected and number of protected areas createdover the past three to four decades has been ac-companied by an evolution of protected areasfrom being small refuges for particular speciesto the protection of entire ecosystems. But evenlarge protected areas can be inadequate to ensure


accessible and less suitable for agriculture andtherefore has a lower risk of clearance. Thiswas illustrated by their results, which showedthat not controlling for these confoundingeffects led to a threefold over‐estimation ofdeforestation reduction within the PAs.These two case studies illustrate the impor-

tance of using statistically robust approachesfor measuring conservation success. Such anapproach should be widely adopted, as itprovides vital information for donors, policydevelopers and managers. However, this willdepend in part on developing a conservationculture that discusses and learns from failure,instead of hiding it from scrutiny (Knight2006).

REFERENCES

Andam,K. S., Ferraro, P. J., Pfaff, A., Sanchez‐Azofeifa,G.A.,and Robalino, J. A. (2008). Measuring the effectiveness ofprotected area networks in reducing deforestation. Pro-ceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of theUnited States of America, 105, 16089–10694.

Ferraro, P. J. and Pattanayak, S. K. (2006). Moneyfor nothing? A call for empirical evaluation ofbiodiversity conservation investments. PLoS Biology, 4,482–488.

Knight, A. T. (2006). Failing but learning: writing thewrongs after Redford and Taber. Conservation Biology,20, 1312–1314.

Linkie, M., Smith, R. J., Zhu, Y., et al. (2008). Evaluatingbiodiversity conservation around a large Sumatranprotected area. Conservation Biology, 22, 683–690.




the persistence of some wildlife populations,particularly large carnivores (Woodroffe andGinsberg 1998). Furthermore, biodiversity con-servation, or the preservation of ecological integri-ty, are only two reasons for establishing andmaintaining protected areas. Other goals may re-late to sustainable development, poverty allevia-tion, peace and social equity. The disparate andoften conflicting global mandates for protectedareas pose the greatest challenge for the designand implementation of effective conservation stra-tegies. The need for reconciliation of conflictingmandateswilldrive thedesignand implementationof innovative approaches to management, gover-nance,financing andmonitoring of protected areas,all of whichwill directly and indirectly impact theireffectiveness in conserving biodiversity.

One such approach involves the design of stra-tegies aimed at managing protected areas as com-ponents of a larger landscape. Given that wildlife,ecological processes and human activities oftenspill across the boundaries of protected areas,conservation that is focused solely within thelimits of protected areas is often faced with diffi-cult challenges. The management of protectedareas therefore cannot occur in isolation fromthe surrounding human- dominated landscapes.Box 15.5 provides a description of a landscape

approach to conservation where protected areasare managed as one component of a larger con-servation landscape that is traversed by land useswhere biodiversity conservation is not the prima-ry objective (see Box 5.3). The entire field of coun-tryside biogeography, of course, focuses on thiskey issue (see Box 13.4).

15.3 Biodiversity and human poverty

There is a considerable degree of spatial overlapof poverty, inequality and biodiversity with highlevels of biodiversity occurring in some of theworld’s poorest countries (McNeely and Scherr2001). The creation of protected areas in order torestrict the use of biodiversity in such countriestherefore has impacts on communities and otheruser groups who benefit economically from di-rectly utilizing biodiversity or converting theland to a more profitable form of use such asoil palm plantations. Protected areas establishedto conserve biodiversity in regions of high pov-erty are under tremendous pressure to serve thedual purpose of economic development andbiodiversity conservation. Consequently, thereis much contention surrounding the relationshipbetween protected areas, people and economic

Box 15.5 From managing protected areas to conserving landscapesKarl Didier

The Ewaso Ecosystem is a vast (40 000 km2) anddiverse savanna region in central Kenya. It isrelatively intact, with most of its biodiversityand all of its megafauna still present, includingelephants (Loxodonta africana), lions (Pantheraleo), giraffe (Giraffa camelopardalis reticulate),the endangered African wild dog (Lycaonpictus), and the last populations of the criticallyendangered Grevy’s zebra (Equus grevyi). Therelative intactness of the Ewaso is owed, inlarge part, to a large network of protectedareas covering 6000 km2 (~15% of the region),including national parks and reserves, andprovincial forest reserves (see Box 15.5 Figure

and Plate 18). However, even with so much ofthe land in protected areas, conservation goalshave yet to bemet: populations of some speciesremain dangerously low (e.g., <300 wild dogs),many other biological species and communitiesare threatened with imminent decline due toincreasing habitat fragmentation (Chapter 5)and conflict beyond the boundaries of theprotected area network (e.g., elephants; seeBox 14.3), and basic ecosystem services (Chapter3), such as production of clean water, arethreatened by land development (e.g., loggingand agriculture) (Chapter 4) and climatechange (Chapter 8).

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Provincial border

National park

National reserve

Forest reserveConservancy/group ranch

Group ranchPrivate ranch(often wildlife friendly)

Government ranch

Private farm

Pastoral area

Army training area

In government trust

Box 15.5 Figure The biodiversity of the Ewaso ecosystem in central Kenya is relatively intact due in large part to a strong set of protectedareas. However, even these are not sufficient to preserve the patterns and processes of biodiversity and to reach conservation objectives. To doso, conservationists are working in the complex matrix of land uses beyond the protected areas, with a vast array of stakeholders, and usingactions that benefit both people and biodiversity.

Why protected areas are not enough?

In the Ewaso and in most areas around theglobe, there are two reasons why protectedarea creation is an incomplete strategy tomeet the conservation objectives. First, pro-

tected areas, whether they cover 5 or 50% ofa region, simply cannot represent the enor-mous array of biodiversity out there. Existingprotected area networks tend to be biasedtoward representing a small subset of species,

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such as large mammals, and fail to representother taxa well, such as plants. This isespecially true in western Africa (see Gardneret al. 2007).Second, even for the elements ofbiodiversity that are represented (i.e. occur atleast once) in protected areas, their long‐termpersistence is rarely ensured by managementof the protected area alone. The problem isthat both biodiversity and the threats tobiodiversity move freely across protected areaboundaries. For example, elephants and wilddogs in the Ewaso rely on habitats andcorridors well beyond protected areas, bring-ing them into conflict with humans. Also,although many threats have their sourceoutside of protected areas, like pollutionadded to the Ewaso River by flower farmersor wandering livestock, they manage todirectly impact biodiversity inside parks. Miti-gation of such threats cannot be achieved bypark management alone, and expansion ofprotected areas is untenable. To ensure thatecosystem services are maintained and thatviable and functional populations (i.e., atappropriate densities) of species persist, con-servation practitioners need to work beyondpark boundaries, into the surrounding hu-man‐dominated matrix.

Defining a “landscape” for conservationpractitioners

The term “landscape” has been defined as “aheterogeneous land area composed of acluster of interacting ecosystems that is re-peated in similar form throughout” (Formanand Godron 1986) or “an area that is spatiallyheterogeneous in at least one factor of inter-est” (Turner et al. 2001). These are interestingfrom a theoretical perspective, but are not veryuseful for a park manager or conservationpractitioner. An alternative definition of a“landscape” for conservation practitionerscould be ‘an area sufficient in size, composi-tion, and configuration of land elements (e.g.,habitats, management types) to support thelong‐term persistence and functioning of all

conservation features of interest, includingecological communities and processes, ecosys-tem services, and functional populations ofspecies’.

Most frequently, this kind of landscapewill beheterogeneous in many aspects, including hu-man land uses, ecosystems or ecological commu-nities, political units, and management units. Inthe Ewaso, the “landscape” includes protectedareas, private lands, villages, community‐ownedlands, untenured lands, parts of at least 10districts, and a diversity of habitats that includerivers, montane forests, acacia savanna andmoorlands (see Box 15.5 Figure). A typical land-scapewill also includeadiversityof stakeholders.In the Ewaso, this includes local ranch ownersand farmers, non‐governmental developmentorganizations [e.g. CARE (Cooperative for Assis-tance and Relief Everywhere)], powerful“county councils” who control large commu-nity‐owned areas, industrial‐scale flower farm-ers often from Europe, and poor, nomadicpastoralists who graze their livestock on tractsof government‐owned land. While defining theboundaries and users of a landscape are difficulttasks, implementation of conservation activitiesat the landscape scale presents an enormouschallenge.

Implementing landscape conservation

Conservation at landscape scales requires, firstand foremost, that practitioners engage com-munities and landowners and implement activ-ities that meet their needs while improving thesituation for biodiversity. In the Ewaso, severalorganizations such as the Laikipia WildlifeForum (LWF) and the Northern RangelandsTrust (NRT) spend much of their resourcesworking outside the boundaries of protectedareas, with community‐owned ranches andconservancies. For example, NRT helps commu-nities obtain formal land ownership from theKenyan government. Once this occurs, theyimplement a suite of activities to help commu-nities generate sustainable income and im-prove conditions for biodiversity. For example,

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development, with conservationists and thoseconcerned with human welfare locked in debate(West and Brockington 2006; Vermeulen andSheil 2007; Robinson 2007). Conservationistsargue that environmental regulations are essen-tial to ensure the sustainability of the planet’sbiological systems and the health and welfareof people, especially local people, and that pro-tected areas are an indispensable tool in thatregulatory toolbox (Peres 1995; Kramer et al.1997; Brandon et al. 1998; Terborgh 1999). Somesocial advocates, on the other end of the spec-trum, contest the establishment and manage-ment of protected areas, and support the beliefs

that: (i) only initiatives related to poverty allevi-ation will lead to successful biodiversity conser-vation since poverty is the root cause ofenvironmental destruction (Duraiappah 1998;Ravnborg 2003); and (ii) Protected areas havebeen frequently established at the expense oflocal communities (in and around protectedareas) through displacement and dispossession,and are responsible for perpetuating poverty bythe continued denial of access to land and otherresources (Ghimire and Pimbert 1997; Colchester2004). In addition, others contend that even ifparks do generate economic value, the distribu-tion of these benefits is so skewed against poor


NRT helps pastoralists on community‐runranches improve their access to livestockmarkets. Improved market access means thatowners receive a higher price per head, canreduce total number of livestock on their lands,and, therefore, improve rangeland quality forwildlife. NRT and LWF also help local commu-nities develop ecotourism enterprises, whichsupplement local incomes, make owners lesssusceptible to the vagaries of livestock man-agement, and gives them incentive to conservebiodiversity. A further example of conservationaction outside protected area boundaries is thework being done by organizations under thebanner of the Laikipia Elephant Project (seealso Boxes 5.3 and 13.4). This project aims todecrease incidents of crop raiding by elephantsin several ways, including providing farmerswith “early warning systems”, training themhow to plant and sell chili peppers (a crop thatelephants hate and which is valuable oninternational markets), or even training peopleto make paper out of elephant dung. Asconservation in the Ewaso demonstrates, toimplement landscape‐scale conservation prac-titioners need an expanded set of tools andskills. Just to name a few, they need skills in theecological and social sciences, law, business andfinance, facilitation and negotiation, conserva-tion planning, zoning, geographic information

systems, remote sensing, and fund raising.While the creation and management of pro-tected areas will remain a cornerstonestrategy for biodiversity conservation, there isan increasing need for traditional strategiesto be augmented with new tools andapproaches to implement landscape scale con-servation.

REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED READING

Forman, R. T. T. and Gordon, M. (1986). Landscapeecology. John Wiley, New York, NY.

Gardner, T. A., Caro, T., Fitzherbert, E.B., Banda, T., andLalbhai, P. (2007). Conservation value of multiple useareas in East Africa. Conservation Biology, 21,1516–1525.

Gaston, K. J., Pressey, R. L., and Margules, C. M. (2002).Persistence and vulnerability: retaining biodiversity in thelandscape and in protected areas. Journal of Biosciences,27, 361–384.

Poiani, K. A., Richter, B. D., Anderson, M. G., and Richter,H. E. (2000). Biodiversity conservation at multiple scales:Functional sites, landscapes, and networks. BioScience,50, 133–146.

Turner, M. G., Gardner, R. H., and O’Neill, R. V. (2001).Landscape ecology in theory and practice. Springer‐Verlag, New York, NY.




rural people that the role of parks in local devel-opment is negligible, and they neither justlycompensate for lost property and rights nor con-tribute to poverty alleviation (Brockington 2003;McShane 2003).

In an analysis of programmatic interventionsaimed at achieving both biodiversity conserva-tion and poverty alleviation, Agrawal and Red-ford (2006) indicate that there is basic lack ofevidence on the extent to which the two goalscan be simultaneously achieved. While the roleof poverty in destroying biodiversity in poorcountries is indisputable, one should never losesight of the overwhelming role that the rich,through their overconsumption, play in extin-guishing life forms all over the Earth (Ehrlichand Ehrlich 2005).

Identifying win-win strategies that simulta-neously benefit biodiversity and people con-

tinues to dominate the agenda of researchersandpractitioners alike and the integrationofpover-ty alleviation and biodiversity conservation goalshas been approached in variousways. Biodiversityuse may not be able to alleviate poverty, but mayhavean important role in sustaining the livelihoodsof the poor, and preventing further impoverish-ment (Angelsen and Wunder 2003). Furthermore,while the vast majority of the world’s poor live insemi urban areas, significant progress in povertyalleviationwillnotbeaffectedbymostconservationactivities (Redford et al. 2008). Biodiversity-richtropical forests subject to high deforestation ratesnonetheless harbor some of the poorest, most re-moteandpoliticallydisenfranchisedforestdwellersoffering distinct opportunities for joint conserva-tion and development initiatives, and have drawnadvocates for newapproaches to “pro-poor conser-vation” (Kaimowitz and Sheil 2007).

Box 15.6 Bird nest protection in the Northern Plains of CambodiaTom Clements

Cambodia is identified by many globalassessments as a conservation priority: forexample it lies within the Indo‐Burma hotspot(Myers et al. 2000) and contains four of theGlobal 200 Ecoregions (Olson and Dinerstein1998). Although it does not support highspecies diversity, Cambodia is of particularimportance for conservation because itcontains some of the largest remainingexamples of habitats that previously spreadacross much of Indochina and Thailand, whichstill support almost intact species assemblages.Many of these species are listed as GloballyThreatened by IUCN due to significant declineselsewhere in their range. Following therestoration of peace in Cambodia in 1993,conservation strategies have primarily focusedon the establishment of Protected Areas (PAs).These PAs generally have a small number ofpoorly paid staff with limited capacity orinfrastructure, i.e. they are ‘paper parks’ (Wilkieet al. 2001). Moreover, PAs usually containexisting human settlements, in some caseswith >10 000 people, whose rights arerespected under law but with varying degreesof implementation. Such a situation is notuncommon: 70% of a non‐random sample of

global PAs contained people, and 54% hadresidents who contested the ownership ofsome percentage of the PA area (Bruner et al.2001). Since limited site information wasavailable when PAs were declared many areasof importance for biodiversity conservation lieoutside the system, emphasizing theimportance of adopting a landscape approach.This requires tools to engage local communitiesin conservation (see Chapter 14).

In the 1980s and 90s Integrated Conservationand Development Projects (ICDPs) were apopular methodology for combining the needsof local communities with conservation, bothinside and outside of PAs. However, there isvery little evidence of conservation success(Wells et al. 1999; Chape 2001; Ferraro and Kiss2002; Linkie et al. 2008). One of the principlereasons suggested for this failure is that thelinkages between project activities (benefits)and biodiversity conservation were weak, i.e.benefits were not contingent on conservationoutcomes. Ferraro and Kiss (2002) havetherefore proposed that communityconservation interventions would be moreeffective if they concentrated on initiativeswhere these linkages are much stronger. ‘Direct

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payments’ and ‘conservation easements’ areactually much more accepted in the USA andEurope and have been recently established inother countries such as Costa Rica (Zbinden andLee 2004). This section describes a directpayment scheme established by the WildlifeConservation Society (WCS), an internationalnon‐governmental organization, in Cambodia.The scheme is evaluated against some of theoriginal claims made by Ferraro and Kiss (2002),specifically that direct payments schemeswould be simpler to implement and thereforehave: (i) efficient institutional arrangements;(ii) be cost‐effective; and (iii) deliver substantialdevelopment benefits, in addition to theconservation benefits.

Methods

The Northern Plains support probably thelargest breeding global population of giant ibis(scientific names in tables) (Critically Endan-gered), a species known from only a handful ofrecords in the 1900s until it was rediscovered in2000 by WCS in the area. Some of the onlyknownnesting sites inmainlandAsia of anotherCritically Endangered species – white‐shoul-dered ibis – are also located in the NorthernPlains. These two ibises are amongst the mostendangered bird species in the world. In addi-tion, the Northern Plains supports breedingpopulations of three Critically Endangeredvulture species – white‐rumped, slender‐billed,and red‐headed vultures – and eight species oflarge waterbirds: greater adjutant, lesser adju-tant, white‐winged duck, sarus crane, Orientaldarter, black‐necked stork, and woolly‐neckedstork. This unique assemblage of nine globallythreatened large bird species means that theNorthern Plains is of exceptional importance forconservation.The primary immediate threat toall these birds is collection of nest contents bylocal people, often for sale to middlemen whotrade with Thai and Lao border markets. This isespecially true for both adjutant species and thesarus cranes – the latter is known to fetch a highmarket price (>US$100 in Thailand). The collec-tion is mostly done by people from localcommunities, who then re‐sell the eggs and

chicks on to middlemen. The Bird nest Protec-tion Program was launched in 2002 by WCS inorder to locate,monitor and protect the nestingsites. Initially the research, protection andmonitoring was undertaken by WCS staff andrangers. However increasingly it has been dis-covered that a much greater number of nestscan be found and successfully protected byworking in cooperation with the local commu-nities, who were originally the principal threat.Under the program, local people are offered areward of up to US$5 for reporting nests, andare then employed to monitor and protect thebirds until the chicks successfully fledge. Theprotection teams are regularly visited every oneto two weeks by community rangers employedby WCS and WCS monitoring staff to check onthe status of the nests and for the purposes ofresearch and data collection. The programoperates year‐round, as some species nest inthe dry season and others during the wetseason. It started in four pilot villages in 2002at one site and was extended to a second site in2004. By 2007 it was operating in >15 villages. In2003 and 2004 nest protectors were paid US$2/day at the end of the month, assuming that thenest went undisturbed during that period. In2005 the payment system was changed follow-ing community consultations to US$1/day forprotecting the nest with a bonus $1/day pro-vided if the chick(s) successfully fledged. Thepayment values were based on an acceptabledaily wage, rather than compensating for theopportunity cost of not collecting, which wouldbe much greater. Local people were concernedabout natural predation, and it was decidedthat payments would still be made in thesecases.

Results and Conclusions

The scheme has been extremely successful (seeBox 15.6 Table 1), protecting over 1200 nests ofglobally threatened or near‐threatened speciessince 2002, including 416 nests in 2007–8. Thenumbers of nests monitored and protectedhave increased by an average of 36% each yearsince 2004. Most of this increase is due togreater numbers of sarus crane, vultures (three

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species), white‐shouldered ibis, Oriental darter,and lesser adjutant being found, suggestingthat persecution and nest collection were themain factors limiting populations of thesespecies. Local awareness regarding the impor-tance of bird conservation has substantiallyimproved, with an almost complete cessationof collection activity at one site, and significantreductions at the other. The direct paymentsscheme has therefore been very effective atdelivering conservation results.Reviewing the first of the claims of Ferraro

and Kiss (2002), the scheme involves a verysimple institutional arrangement: with con-tracts made directly between WCS and theprotectors without involving any other institu-tion. Under Cambodian Law collection of bird

nests contents is actually strictly illegal, butGovernment authorities are not directly in-volved in the scheme, although they doparticipate in regular reviews of results. Thescheme therefore reinforces national law byproviding an incentive to villagers not tocollect bird nests, but not fully compensatingfor the opportunity cost.

A detailed breakdown of the paymentsmade in the 2005–6, 2006–7 and 2007–8seasons is given in Box 15.6 Table 2. The totalcost to WCS of the program is around US$25000 per year, with an average cost of $60–$120per nest protected. The average cost hasdeclined as the number of nests has increased,partly because monitoring costs can be sharedbetween adjacent sites and also due to the

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Box 15.6 Table 1 Bird Nest Protection Program: Nests Protected, 2002‐2008.In some cases nests were protected but there is no data available.‘‐’ indicates species that were probably present, but were not protected in that year. Initially the program started at one sites and operated in twosites from 2004. Numbers found have grown by 36% per year since 2004.

Species Global Status

2002‐3(1 site only)

2003‐4(1 site only)

2004‐5(2 sites)

2005‐6(2 sites)

2006‐7(2 sites)

2007‐8(2 sites)

Nests(Colonies)

Nests(Colonies)

Nests(Colonies)

Nests(Colonies)

Nests(Colonies)

Nests(Colonies)

White shoulderedIbis Pseudibisdavisonii

Critical 1 1 2 3 4 6

Giant Ibis Pseudibisgigantea

Critical ‐ 5 27 28 28 29

Sarus Crane Grusantigone

Vulnerable ‐ 6 19 29 37 54

Vulture spp.(Sarcogyps calvus& Gyps spp.)

Critical ‐ ‐ 1 4 5 5

Black‐necked StorkEphippiorhynchusasiaticus

Near‐threatened

‐ ‐ ‐ 2 3 2

Oriental DarterAnhingamelanogaster

Near‐threatened

13 ‐ ‐ ‐ 26(1) 33(1)

Greater AdjutantLeptoptilusdubius

Endangered ‐ (present, nodata)

21(2) 17(2) 18(2) 10(2)

Lesser AdjutantLeptoptilusjavanicus

Vulnerable ‐ 34(5) 97(16) 134(15) 221(22) 277(27)

Totals, both sites 14 46+ 166 219 342 416


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greater number of nests at colonies. Of thecost of the program, 69–78% of paymentswent directly to local people, with the remain-ing expenditure being monitoring costs in-curred by WCS. The program is therefore verycost‐effective, with an overhead of only 22–31%, substantially less than other conservationapproaches (Ferraro and Kiss 2002). Averagepayments per family are around US$120/year,with considerable variation depending uponhow long people were employed. Some in-dividuals are specialist protectors, switchingspecies depending on the season and receivingcontinual employment for several months. Theamounts paid, sometimes >US$400/individual,are substantial in villages where annual cashincomes are $200–$350/year. Evaluations haveshown that this money is used to pay forclothes, schooling, housing improvements andto enhance food security. The scheme there-fore does provide substantial developmentbenefits, although these are not a primaryobjective of the program. It is also very popularwith villagers because they are able to decidefor themselves how to spend the money (i.e.benefits are not in‐kind).The initial scheme was based upon ‘payments

for work’ (i.e. US$2/day) rather than ‘paymentsfor success’. This led toperverse situationswhereWCSwas perceived as an employer with respon-sibility for protectors’ well‐being, whilst the

protectors shared little of the risk and were notresponsible for the final outcome. In 2005 thepaymentsystemwaschangedto increasetheriskshared by the protectors. That is, they are paid$1/day for theirworkand$1/day for resultsuponsuccessful fledging. This revisedpayment systemdelegates decision‐making to local people, whoare probably more familiar with the situationandmore aware of threats.Payments are also entirely dependent on

money raised annually by WCS, although thescheme is relatively inexpensive in comparisonwiththesubstantial conservationbenefits.How-ever, given the extreme level of threat to manyof these species, with average population sizes<20pairs per sitewhen the schemewas initiated,these were judged acceptable risks. In the long-er‐term financing could become more sustain-able through direct sponsorship, for examplethrough websites or exhibits in zoos. One risk isthat collection would resume if the paymentscheme was stopped.The bird nests protection scheme is linked to a

community‐based ecotourism program. Underthis, communities receive rights to locally man-age ecotourism enterprises in exchange foractiveprotectionof thebiodiversity that touristscome to see. The ecotourism enterprises employadditional groups within the communities,includingmoremarginal groups such as womenand poorer households, reinforcing the value ofthe birds. In addition, as the community enter-prises become more empowered they havebegun to take over local payments for bird nestprotection, funded from tourism receipts. Thisprovides a long‐term sustainable financingmechanism for the initiative.

REFERENCES

Bruner, A. G., Gullison, R. E., and Rice, R. E. (2001).Effectiveness of parks in protecting tropical biodiversity.Science, 291, 125–128.

Chape, S. (2001). An overview of integrated approaches toconservation and community development in the LaoPeople’s Democratic Republic. Parks, 11, 24–32.

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Box 15.6 Table 2 Bird Nest Protection Program: Costs, 2005‐2008.WCS, Wildlife Conservation Society. Currency in US dollars.

2005‐6 2006‐7 2007‐8

Local Payments $ 19850 $ 19119 $ 17434(%) (78%) (74%) (69%)Nest Protection

Payments$ 12597 $ 11248 $ 9786

Community Rangers $ 7253 $ 7871 $ 7648WCS Monitoring $ 5603 $ 6800 $ 7747(%) (22%) (26%) (31%)Expenses $ 2506 $ 3640 $ 4192Salaries $ 3098 $ 3160 $ 3555Total $ 25453 $ 25918 $ 25180Nests Protected 219 342 416Average Cost/Nest $ 116.22 $ 75.78 $ 60.53




Increasingly, conservation practitioners try toprovide incentives to individuals and usergroups to prevent the degradation of biodiver-sity. These incentives lie on a spectrum fromindirect to direct with respect to their linkwith conservation objectives (Ferraro and Kiss2002). The least direct approaches includesupport for the use and marketing of extractedbiological products (e.g. logging, non-timberforest product extraction, hunting) and subsi-dies for reduced impact land and resource use

(e.g. sustainable agriculture). Performance basedpayments for biodiversity conservation repre-sents one of the most direct approaches ofproviding incentives. Box 15.6 outlines anexample of this approach that has been imple-mented to conserve endangered bird species inCambodia.

The evolving relationship between parks andpeople will continue to dominate internationaland national dialogues on biodiversity conserva-tion and stimulate the evolution of innovative

Box 15.7 International activities of the Missouri Botanical GardenPeter H. Raven

The Missouri Botanical Garden (MBG) is theoldest botanical garden in the United States,established in 1859. Modern botanical gardenswere first developed in Europe in the early1500s as adjuncts to schools of medicine, sincethe physicians the medical schools trained hadto be able to recognize those kinds of plantsthat would be effective in treating theirpatients. Consequently, botanical gardens areoften associated with universities: they havecarried out research on plants over the years,as they still do at the present time. During theera of colonization, the colonial powers oftenestablished botanical gardens as places wherethey could grow and investigate what crops ofeconomic value might be useful in thatparticular area. The botanical gardens inSydney, Singapore and Bogor are examples ofinstitutions of this kind that have survived

from the nineteenth century. Botanicalgardens came from very different beginningsfrom zoos, which started as carnivals anddisplays, became permanent facilities underfirst royal and later municipal or statepatronage, and are not historically connectedwith universities. In the modern era, bothbotanical gardens and zoos have recognizedtheir common interest in conservation, sincethe organisms in their care often arebecoming increasingly rare in nature. Thekinds of research collections, herbaria, libraries,and associated databases that are associatedwith comprehensive botanical gardens are notmirrored in the holdings of zoos. Such researchcollections of both plants and animals arefound as part of the holdings of naturalhistory museums, including those inuniversities.

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Ferraro, P. J., and Kiss, A. (2002). Direct paymentsto conserve biodiversity. Science, 298,1718–1719.

Linkie, M., Smith, R. J., Zhu, Y., et al. (2008). Evaluatingbiodiversity conservation around a larger Sumatranprotected area. Conservation Biology, 22, 683–690.

Myers, N., Mittermeier, R. A., Mittermeier, C. G., et al.(2000). Biodiversity hotspots for conservation priorities.Nature, 403, 853–858.

Olson, D. M. and Dinerstein, E. (1998). The Global 200: arepresentation approach to conserving the Earth’s mostbiologically valuable ecoregions. Conservation Biology,12, 502–515.

Wells, M., Guggenheim, S., Khan, A., Wardojo, W.,and Jepson, P. (1999). Investiging in biodiversity:a review of Indonesia’s integrated conservation anddevelopment projects. Directions in developmentseries. World Bank, Indonesia and Pacific IslandsCountry Department, Washington, DC.

Wilkie, D. S., Carpenter, J. F., and Zhang, Q. (2001). Theunder‐financing of protected areas in the Congo Basin:so many parks and so little willingness‐to‐pay. Biodiver-sity and Conservation, 10, 691–709.

Zbinden, S., and Lee, D. R. (2004). Paying for Environ-mental Services: an analysis of participation in CostaRica’s PSA program. Word Development, 33, 255–272.


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The research program of the MissouriBotanical Garden, which initially was centeredon the central United States and eventuallyspread to the Pacific Coast and into Mexico, hassince thefirst part of the twentieth century beenlargely devoted to the tropics. A comprehensiveaccount of the plants of Panamá begun in 1927was completed in 1981. From this base, theresearch program of the garden spread north tosouthern Mexico and south throughout SouthAmerica, to Africa, especially Madagascar; toChina, Vietnam, Lao, and Cambodia, and toNewCaledonia. Our style has often resulted in thepreparation of comprehensive databases, andwe are pushing increasingly towards a state inwhich all of the information about plants wouldbe on the web and available for use or revisiondirectly. Over a third of the plants of the world,more than 100 000 species, are being treatedthrough one or more of the projects of theMissouri Botanical Garden.Since the 1970s, the Garden’s program has

been organized around the activities ofbotanists resident in individual countries whoseplants we are studying. We decided early onthat it would not be possible to investigate theplants of any area thoroughly enough bymeans of intermittent expeditions and that wewould be far more able to help in buildinginstitutions and training people if we lived onthe ground with them. Thus our work inNicaragua was based on Doug Stevens’residence of 11 years in the country, starting inthe 1970s, that lead to the formation ofsubstantial library and herbarium resources,and has, then and subsequently, resulted in thetraining of dozens of Nicaraguan botanists andconservationists. Through our continuinginteractions with the government and manyvisits since, we have been able to do a greatdeal not only in technical botany but moreimportantly in building institutions throughcollaboration and by keeping in touch withindividuals in our fields of study. Conservationand sustainability have become landmarks ofour long‐term intentions. In Peru, for example,empowering the Yanesha, indigenous peoplewho want to use their resources sustainably,has been a major effort that continues to thepresent. Similar efforts are underway inEcuador and Bolivia, and of course they are

complementary in building knowledge of theplants of a particular region. In Costa Rica,resident MBG botanist Barry Hammelcollaborates with the National Institute ofBiodiversity (INBio) and the Museo Nacional inthe production of a Manual Flora of the Plantsof Costa Rica, one of the countries in theNeotropics where the most varied andcomprehensive biological research is beingconducted – we are sure that our manual willfill a gap by providing complete and up‐to‐dateinformation on all kinds of plants found in thecountry.In Madagascar, where MBG has been active

for more than 30 years, we maintain a staff ofmore than 50 people, all but oneMalagasy, andmany trained in our joint Masters’ degreeprograms with the University of Antananarivo.We are preparing a comprehensive, highlyrevised database on all theplants of the country,and finding about a third more kinds than hadbeen recorded earlier, so that this island, whichis about 50% larger than California, may behome to more than 13 000 species of plants.More than 90% of these are found nowhereelse, and more than 80% of the naturalvegetation in Madagascar has been destroyed,so that our team is literally engaged in a raceagainst time, finding the places where plantsgrow and determining which are most criticalfor conservation. By Presidential Decree, theamountof preserved land in the country is beinggreatly increased at present, and it is of keyimportance tomake the best choices concerningwhat should be set aside. The sustainability ofcertain communities, such as Mahabo, is beingenhanced through collaboration with theScandellaris Center of the Business School atWashington University in St. Louis, so that poorpeople may have alternatives to simply takingproducts unsustainably from an ever‐diminishing forest – the key to biologicalconservation on a large scale.The world will achieve sustainability only if

efforts of this kind are repeated everywhereand the local efforts are united as a basis forcommon action. Along with sister institutionssuch as the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, andThe New York Botanical Garden, we arecontributing what we can toward the solutionof our common challenge.




approaches for reconciliation (Koh and Wilcove2007). Solutions for capturing opportunities thatsimultaneously protect biodiversity and reducepoverty, often boil down to improving institu-tions and governance, but there are no easy gen-eralizations (Chomitz 2007).

15.4 Capacity needs for practicalconservation in developing countries

In many developing economies with rich tropicalbiodiversity, government agencies responsiblefor the management of protected areas lack thenecessary technical capacity to stem biodiversityloss effectively. These gaps in capacity occur at alllevels, from the need for direct managementof natural resources, to the compliance require-ments of multilateral agreements (Steiner et al.2003). At the ground level, managers of naturalresources including biodiversity within protectedareas often have limited access to the vast anddynamic body of knowledge and tools in conser-vation science. There is an urgent and critical needto transfer the advances in conservation science toindividuals and institutions in biodiversity-richcountries. Building the capacity needed to imple-ment conservation strategies and apply conserva-tion principles represents one of the greatestchallenges facing the field of conservation biology(Rodriguez et al. 2006).

Increasing capacity in applied conservation iscomplex: it involves not only the training of in-service conservation professionals but also the en-hancement of university graduate and undergrad-uate programs that will generate a cadre of futureconservation professionals. In order to be effectivein thefield of conservation, graduates of such train-ing programs need relevant multidisciplinaryknowledge and practical skills such as problem-solving and conflict resolution to tackle the com-plexities of biological and societal issues that char-acterize applied conservation (Noss 1997).

The urgency of the biodiversity crisis coupledwith the general scarcity of funds and short projecttimelines make on-the-job training of individualsthe most common approach to tackle the lack ofcapacity.NGOs for instance,workwith individuals

on specific projects and attempt to build capacitythat is often quite specialized. However, a longer-term approach to building capacity would neces-sarily involve targeting relevant programs at uni-versitiesandprofessional traininginstitutions.Lackof financial resources and educational infrastruc-ture are key limitations facing universities with re-gard to training for conservation. Addressing theseissueswill requireconcerted investment infinancialand human capacity, but important initiatives areunderway to begin this process.

StronglinkagesbetweeninternationalNGOsandacademic/professional institutions in countriessuch as Lao PDR are often key to provide fieldtraining opportunities in applied conservation re-search and management. Organizations such aszoological societies, natural history museums, andbotanical gardens (see Box 15.7) are increasinglyengaged in long-term conservation and capacitybuilding efforts. In certain situations, such linkagesmaybetheonlymeansforstudentsaswellasstaffofnatural resource management agencies to gainvaluablefieldexperience inprojectdesignandman-agement tocomplement theoreticalknowledgeandskills theymay have acquired in the classroom.

For instance, the Network of ConservationEducators and Practitioners (NCEP, http://ncep.amnh.org), a project led by the Center forBiodiversity and Conservation of the AmericanMuseum of Natural History, aims to improvetraining in conservation biology through innova-tive educational materials and methods that di-rectly target teachers of conservation biology.NCEP is a global initiative, currently active inBolivia, Lao PDR, Madagascar, Mexico, Myan-mar, Peru, Rwanda, the United States and Viet-nam. The project seeks to create and make widelyavailable a variety of resources to teach biodiver-sity conservation, and develop networks and re-source centers to increase mentoring and trainingopportunities in biodiversity conservation world-wide. A central goal of the project is to increaseteachers’ and trainers’ access to high quality andfree of cost teaching materials. To meet this goal,NCEP develops collaborations with partner insti-tutions and individuals including conservationpractitioners to develop a series of multi-compo-nent teaching resources called modules adapted


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for local use. For example, in the Lao People’sDemocratic Republic (Lao PDR), a densely forest-ed, land-locked country with high levels of biodi-versity in Southeast Asia, NCEP established apartnership with The Wildlife Conservation Soci-ety and the National University of Laos (NUoL)to help develop the capacity of trainers in thescience and forestry faculties to teach topicsin conservation biology to undergraduates.Most young professionals employed in naturalresource research and management agenciesin the country today have graduated from thescience or forestry faculties at the NUoL. Thesefaculties have a critical need for up-to-date rele-vant materials in the Lao language for teachingbiodiversity conservation principles.

Local adaptation is an important feature of theNCEP project, empowering in-country partnersand making the materials immediately usefulfor faculty, students, and professionals who arealready working in or associated with the fieldof biodiversity conservation. The project alsofound it useful to couple module training with ap-plied research for students and faculty atfield sites.The applied research served to reinforce learningand comprehension of new biodiversity conserva-tion topics and terms in addition to providing criti-cal exposure to real-world conservation.

A second phase of the NCEP project in Lao PDRinvolvesbuilding the capacityofuniversity trainersto teach relevant aspects of applied conservation toprotected area managers from seven National Pro-tected Areas across the country. During this pro-cess, conservation science principles and casestudies of applied conservation approaches will beadapted to make them more accessible to instruc-tors to use as training materials for protected areamanagers who could apply those principles toachieve conservation results on the ground.

Capacity building activities can consume vastresources, potentially diverting already limitedconservation funds away from other, more imme-diate conservation problems that involve direct ac-tions at the site-level to reduce threats (for example,monitoringandenforcement).Moreover, justifyinginvestment in capacity building activities is some-timeschallengedbythedifficulties involvedinmea-suring success in the short-term. Yet, building

capacity is vital to a longer-term vision of enablingresponsible stewardship of biodiversity.

15.5 Beyond the science: reaching outfor conservation

Globally, a key challenge to achieving conserva-tion goals is the need to capture the interestof local people in a manner that stimulatescooperation and positive conservation actions(Brewer 2002). This need, sometimes defined asa form of social marketing, is a compelling reasonfor conservation biologists to work more closelywith local communities to mobilize supportfor conservation through better informed andcarefully designed outreach (Johns 2003).The process of involving local communities livingadjacent to threatened species and their habitatshelps build a constituency that is more aware ofits role either as part of the problem or some-times, as part of the solution, in a protected area(Steinmetz et al. 2006). This awareness is crucialto the effective implementation of conservationstrategies. Field-based research outreach andpartnership programs facilitate a two-way dia-logue: local participants learn firsthand whatscientists do, how they do it, and why they do itand by working with local communities, scien-tists can learn how local residents relate to thethreatened species and habitats they study.

In the Thung Yai Naresuan Wildlife Sanctuary(3622 km2) in western Thailand, commercialhunting contributed heavily to extensive popula-tion declines for most species and subsistencehunting was locally significant for some carni-vores, leaf monkeys (Presbytis sp.), and deer.Workshops with local communities clarifiedwhich species were at highest risk of local extinc-tion, where the most threatened populationswere, and the causes of these patterns. Scientists,protected area managers and local peopleworked together to assess wildlife declines andjointly define and understand the scale of theproblem during workshops. As a result, localpeople and sanctuary managers increased com-munication, initiated joint monitoring and patrol-ling, and established wildlife recovery zones.




While conflict between local people and the parkauthorities has not completely disappeared, thereis interest to work together on wildlife issues(Steinmetz et al. 2006).

15.6 People making a difference: A Rareapproach

Recognizing the important role that communitiescan play in conservation, a US based conservationorganization known as Rare has adopted a mis-sion to “conserve imperiled species and ecosys-tems around the world by inspiring people tocare about and protect nature” (www.rareconser-vation.org; see Box 12.2). Rare fulfills this missionby addressing some of the most pressing needs ofthe global conservation movement. Rare trainsand mentors local conservation leaders in theuse of proven outreach tools, builds partnershipsto leverage their investments and evaluate les-sons learned to continuously improve the prac-tice of conservation.

Rare’s flagship program for constituency build-ing is known as the Rare Pride campaign (Box12.2). A hybrid of traditional education and pri-vate sector marketing strategies, Rare Pride cam-paigns inspire people who live in the world’smost biodiverse places to take pride in their nat-ural heritage and embrace conservation. Pridecampaign managers are local conservationistswho make two year commitments to inspire en-vironmental protection at every level in theircommunities. Campaign managers are trainedby the organization during a university-basedprogram in social marketing culminating in aMaster’s degree in Communications for Conser-vation from the University of Texas (El Paso).

Pride campaigns utilize a charismatic flagshipspecies, like the Saint Lucia parrot or the Philip-pine cockatoo, which becomes a symbol of localpride and acts as a messenger to build support forneeded behavior changes for habitat and wildlifeprotection. Marketing tools such as billboards,posters, songs, music videos, sermons, comicbooks, and puppet shows make conservationmessages positive, compelling, relevant, and funfor the community. Campaigns aim to generate

an increased sense of pride and public steward-ship that goes beyond mere awareness-raising.Pride campaigns involve and engage several seg-ments of the community: teachers, business andreligious leaders, elected officials, and the aver-age citizen. Rare Pride is currently being em-ployed on a global scale, and has beensuccessfully replicated by partner organizationsin over 40 countries.

15.7 Pride in the La Amistad BiosphereReserve, Panama

ThefarmingtownofCerroPunta,withapopulationof 7000, lies at the gateway to a forest corridorbetween Barú Volcano National Park in Panamaand La Amistad Biosphere Reserve shared withCostaRicathatencompassesoneofthe largest tractsof undisturbed rainforest inoneof themost biologi-cally diverse regions in the world. The corridorbetween the two parks is important for the move-mentofglobally significant species includingocelot(Leopardus pardalis), puma (Puma concolor), Baird’stapir (Tapirus bairdii), white-faced capuchin mon-key (Cebus capucinus), and theResplendentQuetzal(Pharomachrus mocinno). The land is under threat.Themildclimateandrichvolcanicsoil creates fertileconditions that include fourgrowing seasonsayearfor agricultural crops. Consequently, Cerro Puntaproduces 80% of all the vegetables grown in Pana-ma(population3.2million).Cropsarecultivatedonthe steepmountainsideswithout any terraces caus-ing heavy erosion during the rainy season. Giventhe farmers’ heavy reliance on synthetic chemicalpesticides and fertilizers, erosion and run-off fromthe cultivated slopes leads to downstream waterpollution with deleterious health impacts for resi-dents. Furthermore, the erosion slowly forces farm-ers to clear more land for new fields, closer andcloser to the two parks and the corridor betweenthem.Inaddition tothe threatofagriculturalexpan-sion, there is persistent pressure to build roads orhighways through the La Amistad Biosphere re-serveasexploitationforcoalandminerals increases.Deforestation, cattle ranching, hunting, and com-mercial extraction are also serious threats to thePark’s rich flora and fauna.


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LaAmistad needed a strong constituency lobby-ing for conservation, as well as significant changein community farmingmethods. LuisOlmedoSan-chez Samudio, a Sunday school teacher from afarming family in Cerro Punta, knew that creatingreal change in his community would require adramatically different approach. Sanchez Samudiocompleted Rare’s program at the University ofGuadalajara in Mexico to learn how to implementa full scale Pride social marketing campaign in LaAmistad. The Fundacion para el Desarrollo Inte-gral del Corregimiento de Cerro Punta (FUNDIC-CEP), with Sanchez Samudio on their staff, alliedwith Rare and one of the biggest InternationalNGOs, The Nature Conservancy, in this effort.Sanchez undertook the formidable task of reachingout to radio stations, schools, fairs, and the farmersthemselves in a relentless effort to change decades-old customs and attitudes. Panama’s ResplendentQuetzal was chosen to serve as the campaign’sflagship species and used to talk about a range ofconservation issues. Named “Quelly”, an image ofthe Resplendent Quetzal appears on all campaignmaterials, reminding people of the importance ofhabitat protection. After several months of forma-tive research, including surveys and focus groupswith local farmers, Sanchez Samudio launched hiscampaignwith over 30 outreach vehicles includingposters, advertisements, bumper stickers, radioshows, mascots, classroom visits, sermons, work-shops, festivals, and much more. Sanchez encour-aged farmers to adopt sustainable agriculturalpracticeswhile garnering support from clergymen,legislators and other relevant sources. Post cam-paign surveydata tomeasure effectiveness showedthat 52% of the respondents were aware of thebenefits of living near a protected area, up fromjust 15%at the beginningof the campaign; 85%saidthey were ready to petition the government forbetter controls of agricultural chemicals, up from61% at the beginning. Other indicators, such aswhether respondents knew of alternatives to agri-cultural chemicals, remained flat at around 30%.Promoting alternatives became the central focus ofSanchez’ follow-upefforts to conserve theLaAmis-tad Biosphere Reserve—his local pride. To learnmore about Rare’s social marketingmethodologiesfor conservation, visit www.rareconservation.org.

15.8 Outreach for policy

While local communities and protected area offi-cials are important targets for outreach activities,an equally challenging need is for scientists andpractitioners to engage in outreach that influencespolicy goals (Noss 2007). However there is ac-knowledged lack of clarity regarding advocacy inconservationbiologywhich influences theabilityofconservation biologists to effectively direct theirexpertise to policy decisions (Chan et al. 2005,2008). At the core of this debate is the degree towhich conservation biologists honor their commit-ment to the inherent value of biodiversity.

Given that scientists are still trained almost en-tirely in research methods, not public communica-tion or policy intervention (Lovejoy 1989), there issome fear that engagement inpublic education andpolicy intervention can reduce credibility (Block-stein 2002). One thread of this debate is based onthe need to relinquish commitment to the inherentvalue of biodiversitywhile another thread suggeststhat conservationbiologists should explicitly advo-cate for values (e.g. biodiversity) and are obligatedto step well beyond research to recommend solu-tions to policy goals (Chan 2008).

15.9 Monitoring of Biodiversity at Localand Global Scales

Monitoring is critically essential to determine theextent towhich protected areas are effective in con-serving biodiversity or achieving other manage-ment objectives. Monitoring that providesassessment of threats in amanner that allowsman-agers to respond effectively, is central to good con-servationmanagement (see Chapter 16). Danielsenet al. (2000) define ‘monitoring’ as data samplingwhich is: (i) repeated at certain intervals of time formanagement purpose; (ii) replicable over an ex-tended time frame; and (iii) focuses on rates andmagnitude of change. Monitoring helps identifypriority areas for research and conservation, andto quantify the response of plant and animal popu-lations to disturbance and management interven-tions. Countries contracting to the Convention onBiological Diversity are obliged to monitor




Box 15.8 Hunter self‐monitoring by the Isoseño‐Guaranı´ in the Bolivian ChacoAndrew Noss

The 34 400 km2 Kaa‐Iya del Gran ChacoNational Park (KINP) in Bolivia was created in1995 to protect the Gran Chaco’s naturalresources and the traditional use areas of theindigenous residents surrounding it, theIsoseño‐Guaraní, Chiquitano and Ayoreo (and agroup of non‐contacted Ayoreo living withinit). It is the largest dry forest protected area inthe world, and contains high levels of biologicaldiversity, particularly mammals, with at least 10endemic mammal taxa, most notably theChacoan guanaco (Lama guanicoe voglii ) andthe Chacoan peccary (Catagonus wagneri)(Ibisch and Me´rida 2003). KINP is the firstprotected area in South America co‐managedby an indigenous organization, the Capitanı´adel Alto y Bajo Isoso (CABI) which is the politicalauthority representing the 10 000 Isoseño‐Guaranı´ inhabitants of the Isoso. Isoseñolivelihoods are based on agriculture, livestock,hunting, fishing and permanent and seasonalwage labor. Prior to the creation of the KINP,most of the 23 Isoso communities had legaltitles of their lands as community landscovering an area of 650 km2, encompassingsettlements, farming, and livestock lands. In1997, based on their historical occupation ofthe area over the past 300 years, CABI formallydemanded 19 000 km2 as a ‘Tierra Comunitariade Orı´gen’ or TCO adjacent to, but notoverlapping, the KINP. Principal threats to boththe TCO and KINP include illegal settlementsand inappropriate management of land andnatural resources with the conversion of Chacoforests to soybean farms and extensive cattleranches (overstocking, no management offorage, minimal veterinary care), sport huntingby city‐based hunters, and large‐scale regionalinfrastructure programs that includeinternational gas pipelines and highways.Like other indigenous groups, many

traditional beliefs and local practices amongthe Isoseño influence their hunting behaviorsto favor wildlife conservation. A hunter mustfollow certain rules in order to retain the favorof the spirits that guard wildlife. For example,hunters should not hunt young animals, huntexcessively or beyond family needs, or mistreatanimals by wounding them and allowing themto escape. Additional local practices that favor

wildlife conservation include seasonal rotationof hunting areas that respond to seasonalmovements of animals according to availabilityof food, as well as the accessibility of differentareas, no hunting of certain vulnerable species(primates, guanacos) and the substitution ofother activities (such as fishing and farming) tohunting in particular seasons. Seeking tointegrate these traditional beliefs and localknowledge of wildlife with political/administrative requirements and scientificmanagement, in 1996 a joint team of aninternational NGO, the Wildlife ConservationSociety, and CABI personnel initiated a wildlifeand hunting monitoring program in the 23Isoseño communities. The principal objectiveswere to: (i) determine whether subsistence(armadillos, peccaries, brocket deer, tapir) andcommercial (parrots, tegu lizards) hunting byIsoseño communities was sustainable;(ii) generatemanagement recommendations toensure that hunting would be sustainable inthe indigenous territory, thereby reducingpotential pressure on the KINP; and(iii) consolidate the concepts and practices ofwildlife management together with huntersand communities (Painter and Noss 2000). Theprincipal method to estimate hunting offtakeswas a hunter self‐monitoring program withvoluntary participation: hunters carried datasheets with them on hunting excursions torecord information on the hunt and on anycaptured animals, and they collected specimens(skulls/jawbones, stomach contents, fetuses) ofhunted animals. Community hunting monitorsassisted the hunters to record, collect andanalyze the data for the entire community on amonthly basis (Noss et al. 2003, 2004).

The communities selected Isoseñoparabiologists and hunting monitors, themajority with an elementary and some withhigh school education. Following an initial sixmonth volunteer period, those who expressedthe most interest and initiative were hired bythe program.Monitors (seven to ten individualseach living and working in their homecommunity) were hunters hired part‐time tosupport the recording of hunting data incommunities (by encouraging hunters toparticipate in the self‐monitoring program, and

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by periodically collecting information fromhunters in their community). Parabiologists (sixto eight individuals working in their homecommunity or other research sites in the Isoso)were hired full‐time to support wildliferesearch according to their individualspecialization. Through field courses andpractical experience, these Isoseño techniciansbegan to assume greater responsibility fordesigning and implementing researchprograms with hunters.Hunter self‐monitoring (100–150 hunters per

month) combined with monthly activity recordsfor potential hunters (7637 observed hunter‐months) permitted estimations of total offtakesof subsistence game species for 1996–2003, aswell as catch‐per‐unit‐effort over the same timeperiod. These data showed considerablefluctuations from year to year and no decliningtrends that would suggest over‐hunting.Experience from the monitoring project

suggested that even simple approaches such ashunter self‐monitoring or line transect surveysrequiredconsiderableeffortbybothproject staffand volunteers in order to provide sufficientinformation for management interventions.Thus, precise and detailed population densityestimatesaredifficult toobtain in situationswitha large number of species and/or large studyareas such as the Isoso with only basic tools andnon‐professional personnel.Ideally, adaptive management would include

continuous population monitoring over longtime periods using selected indicator speciesassemblages, detailed studies of ecologicalprinciples and processes, and studies ofpopulation trends in sink and source areas(Kremen et al. 1994; Hill et al. 2003). Suchdetailed monitoring is prohibitively complexand expensive not only for territories under thejurisdiction of indigenous peoples but also formost protected areas in general.Instead, it may be more useful to consider

adaptive management in a broader contextfocusing on fundamental requirements forinformed decision‐making. Assuming thatcommunal decision‐making is the key, detailedscientific information and sophisticated analyses

may not be as important as ensuring that: (i)information familiar to resource managers isused; and (ii) participatory methods provide theinputs and framework for discussion (see alsoDanielsen et al. 2005). Hunter self‐monitoringprovides a means to engage large numbers ofcommunity members in data collection. Bygenerating the data themselves, people becomeconscious of underlying problems, for exampleperceived or actual over‐hunting of a certainspecies, and can thus think about solutions toaddress the problems. In turn, reflectionprocesses may lead to preliminary managementaction that can be consolidated in an adaptivemanagement process. Approaches thatintegrate traditional customs and knowledgewith scientific methods, bringing togethercommunity members with specialists can havepositive outcomes for conservation (Becker et al.2005; Townsend et al. 2005). In the Isoso case,this integration took place at several levels. At afirst level, community members indicatedthrough discussions the most important gamespecies and described hunting practices andtraditions regarding wildlife management. Inturn, through hunter self‐monitoring andobservation of hunting activities, huntersthemselves and trained community members(parabiologists and monitors) confirmed andquantified what hunters did in practice. Strongtraditional authority structure and communityorganization, a favorable legal/institutionalframework, the ability of governmentauthorities to appropriately implement theirresponsibilities, and financial and technicalsupport from private partners to the processwere all important determinants of effectiveengagement of communities in this wildlifemonitoring program.This box is adapted from Noss et al. (2005).

REFERENCES

Becker, C. D., Agreda, A., Astudillo, E., Constantino,M., and Torres P. (2005). Community‐basedsurveys of fog capture and biodiversity monitoringat Loma Alta, Ecuador enhance social capital and

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biodiversity (Article 7.b), and donors increasinglydemand accountability and quantifiable achieve-ments in return for their assistance. Given thatbiodiversity conservation is one of the keyobjectives of protected areas, the developmentof biodiversity monitoring systems for protectedareas now attracts a significant proportionof the international funding for biodiversity conser-vation.

However, conflicts between the scientific idealsand practical realities of monitoring influence theimplementation and effectiveness of monitoringsystems. For instance, most practitioners agreethat in an ideal world, monitoring programswould always be spatially and temporally com-prehensive, rigorous in their treatment of sam-pling error, and sustainable over the time scalesnecessary to examine population and communitylevel processes (Yoccoz et al. 2001). Nevertheless,monitoring of biodiversity and resource use inthe real world is often costly and hard to sustain,especially in developing countries, where finan-cial resources are limited. Moreover, such moni-toring can be logistically and technically difficult,and is often perceived to be irrelevant by resource

managers and local stakeholders. Many suggestthe need to identify some middle ground be-tween the need for scientific rigor and goals forprogram sustainability. Practitioners disagreeabout whether such a balance exists, and theissue has become a source of debate. At the centreof this debate is the fact that where suggestions orexamples of ‘appropriate’monitoring in develop-ing countries exist, they generally are unprovenin their ability to detect ‘true’ trends. On the onehand, poor statistical power and bias may turnoverly simplistic monitoring schemes into wastesof time and precious resources – yet equallywasteful are programs so intensive they cannotbe sustained long enough to address questionsfundamental to effective management (Yoccozet al. 2001, 2003; Danielsen et al. 2003; Chapter16). Box 15.8 examines the issue of biologicalmonitoring within the context of a communitywildlife management program in the Kaa IyaDel Gran Chaco in Bolivia.

The technicalandstatisticalproblemsofmonitor-ing at a local level are relatively benign when com-pared to the problems of tackling monitoring at aglobal scale. Under the terms of an agreement


institutional cooperation. Biodiversity Conservation, 14,2695–2707.

Danielsen, F., Burgess, N., and Balmford, A. (2005). Mon-itoring matters: examining the potential of locally‐basedapproaches. Biodiversity Conservation, 14, 2507–2542.

Hill, K., McMillan, G., and Farin, A. R. (2003). Hunting‐related changes in game encounter rates from 1994 to2001 in the Mbaracayu´ Reserve, Paraguay. Conserva-tion Biology, 17, 1312–1323.

Ibisch, P. and Me´rida, G. (2003). Biodiversidad: la riquezade Bolivia. Estado de conocimien to y conservacion.Fundación Amigos de la Naturaleza, Santa Cruz, CA.

Kremen, C., Merenlender, A. M., and Murphy, D. D.(1994). Ecological monitoring: a vital need for integratedconservation and development programs in the tropics.Conservation Biology, 8, 388–397.

Noss, A. J., Cue´llar, E., and Cue´llar, R. L. (2003). Hunter self‐monitoringas a basis for biological research: data from theBolivian Chaco.Mastozoologı´ a Neotropical, 10, 49–67.

Noss, A. J., Cue´llar, E., and Cue´llar, R.l. (2004). Anevaluation of hunter self‐ monitoring in the BolivianChaco. Human Ecology, 32, 685–702.

Noss, A. J., Oetting, I., and Cuéllar, R. L. (2005). Hunterself‐monitoring by the Isoseño‐Guaraní in theBolivian Chaco. Biodiversity Conservation, 14,2679–2693.

Painter, M. and Noss, A. (2000). La conservacio´n defauna con organizaciones comunales: experienciacon el pueblo Izocen˜ o en Bolivia. In E. Cabrera,C. Mercolli and R. Resquin, eds Manejo de faunasilvestre en Amazonı´ a y Latinoame´ rica.pp. 167–180. CITES Paraguay, Fundacio´ n MoisesBertoni, University of Florida, Asuncio´ n,Paraguay.

Townsend, W. R., Borman, A. R., Yiyoguaje, E., andMendua, L. (2005). Cofa´ n Indians’ monitoring offreshwater turtles in Za´ balo, Ecuador. Biodiversityand Conservation, 14, 2743–2755.


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signed at the Johannesburg Summit on SustainableDevelopment in 2002, 190 countries committed to“asignificant reduction” in thecurrentrateof lossofbiodiversity.But thechallengesofestimatingglobalrates of loss are enormous (summarized by Balm-ford et al. 2005), and as the target of 2010 is ap-proached, most indicators developed inevitablyinvolve the use of indirect or surrogate data onhabitat loss, protected area overlays with knownpatterns of biodiversity or with targeted studies ofwell known vertebrate taxa.

In thisbrief reviewwehave touchedonanumberof the challenges in translatingconservationscienceinto practical, field based conservation actions.Conservation action lags behind conservation sci-ence for a number of reasons. Inevitably, there willbe time lags in thedissemination andapplication ofnew ideas to real world situations, and the way inwhich theory informs practice will not always beclear at the outset. But there will also be gaps be-tween the interests and needs of conservation prac-titioners, and the issues and areas of intellectualpursuit that are valued by academic departments,and institutional science donors.

Summary

· Integrating the inputs of decision-makers andlocal people into scientifically rigorous conservationplanning is a critically important aspect of effectiveconservation implementation.

· Protected areas represent an essential componentof approaches designed to conserve biodiversity.However, given that wildlife, ecological processesand human activities often spill across the bound-aries of protected areas, designing strategies aimedat managing protected areas as components of larg-er human-dominated landscapes will be necessaryfor their successful conservation.

· Identifying strategies that simultaneously benefitbiodiversity conservation and economic develop-ment is a challenge that remains at the forefront ofapplied conservation. Biodiversity use may not beable to alleviate poverty, but may have an importantrole in sustaining the livelihoods of the poor, andpreventing further impoverishment. Strong institu-tions and good governance are prerequisites forsuccessful conservation interventions.

· Capacity needs for practical conservation in de-veloping countries occur at many levels from skillsneeded for management of natural resources to thecompliance requirements of multilateral agree-ments. Filling gaps in capacity involves a diversityof approaches from on-the-job training of indivi-duals to restructuring academic and professionaltraining programs. Prioritizing capacity needs isvital to a longer-term vision of enabling responsiblestewardship of biodiversity.

· The engagement of local communities inplanning and implementation is critical for effectiveconservation. Carefully designed social marketingapproaches have proved to be successful in captur-ing the interest of local people while achieving con-servation goals.

· Monitoring is a central tenet of good conservationmanagement. Conflicts between the scientific idealsand practical realities of monitoring influence the im-plementationandeffectivenessofmonitoringsystems.

· Many of the key issues and barriers to effectiveconservation that face conservation biologists areinherently political and social, not scientific. Thusefforts to close the gap between conservation biolo-gists and conservation practitioners who take actionon the ground will require unprecedented collabo-ration between ecologists, economists, statisticians,businesses, land managers and policy-makers.

Suggested readingFerraro, P. J. and Pattanayak, S. K. (2006). Money for noth-ing? A call for empirical evaluation of biodiversity con-servation investments. PLoS Biology, 4, 482–488.

Pressey, R. L., Cabeza, M., Watts, M. E., et al. (2007). Con-servation planning in a changing world. Trends in Ecolo-gy and Evolution, 22, 583–592.

Terborgh, J. (1999). Requiem for nature. Island Press,Washington, DC.

Relevant websites

· Cape Action Plan for the Environment (CAPE): http://www.capeaction.org.za/

· Centre for Evidence-based conservation: http://www.cebc.bangor.ac.uk/ and http://www.conservationevi-dence.com/

· Network of Conservation Educators and Practitioners:http://ncep.amnh.org




· RARE: www.rareconservation.org

· Living Landscapes: http://www.wcslivinglandscapes.com/

· Natural Capital Project: www.naturalcapitalproject.org

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