- The world needs to embrace an inclusive approach to recognizing and tracking area-based conservation, a new op-ed by a group of researchers argues.
- Momentum has been growing around establishing and tracking protected areas (PAs) and Other Effective area-based Conservation Measures (OECMs) to achieve 30×30 conservation goals, but a wide variety of such efforts occur beyond these, and are underrepresented in global databases: the authors found >40% of the land in Amazon countries is governed with conservation potential or intention, a significantly larger percentage than is reported in the official database.
- “We advise researchers, donors, and decision-makers to consider and inventory a broader scope of area-based conservation and more diverse actors than they currently do. This approach can enhance research, conservation planning, funding allocation, and program strategies to achieve national conservation targets,” the researchers write.
- This article is a commentary. The views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily Mongabay.
To help address the biodiversity crisis, momentum has been gaining around establishing and tracking protected areas (PAs) and Other Effective area-based Conservation Measures (OECMs) to achieve 30-by-30, the conserving of 30% of our Earth by 2030. However, a wide variety of conservation efforts occur beyond PAs and OECMs, often led by actors that are traditionally underrepresented in global databases. How do we track global conservation progress to best support inclusive and equitable conservation?
Currently, global area-based conservation progress is officially tracked by the World Databases on Protected Areas (WDPA) and on Other Effective area-based Conservation Measures (WD-OECM). These databases rely primarily on reporting by governments. However, it is possible to approach the challenge of recognizing conservation areas differently.
A more inclusive, bottom-up, and empirically-based approach, parallel to the official process, can look holistically to where people are already managing areas with conservation intent, or in ways that have potential conservation outcomes. To be effective, the approach should engage local knowledge and embrace diverse inputs, rather than defaulting to top-down guidance with predefined criteria.
To illustrate the importance of a more inclusive approach of tracking conservation progress, we tested such an approach in the Amazonian countries and territories, and uncovered some unique insights. By simply utilizing existing literature, reports, legal documents, and local expertise, we already get a better idea of conservation progress and potential than official databases. For instance, we found that more than 40% of the land area of all nine Amazonian countries is governed with conservation potential or intention, a coverage significantly larger than the 27.7% reported in the official database (See Figure 1 below).
In the Amazon biome alone, about 62% of land is under some form of conservation governance systems. Additionally, official databases contain fewer types of governance systems, including Indigenous and communal lands such as quilombos in Brazil, payment for ecosystem services programs such as the ‘socio bosque’ program in Ecuador and Peru’s national forest conservation program, eco-certified production areas, and many more.
How we define and recognize conservation areas has real implications for people living in and managing these critical places. For instance, a sole emphasis on PAs and OECMs creates uncertainties for millions of Indigenous peoples and local communities residing in their traditionally governed lands that are identified as priorities for reaching the 30% target. Within a strict framework, these communities may feel undue pressure to either (1) have their lands become recognized as protected areas, often involving giving up some rights, or (2) demonstrate site-level effectiveness – requiring additional time and resources for monitoring – to have recognition and support.
Forcing global frameworks for PAs or OECMs on existing conservation or stewardship systems may risk undermining or even pushing out existing actors, and thwarting their agency and functioning governance system, thereby hurting biodiversity and human well-being. In contrast, a more open approach towards area-based conservation can recognize the contributions of previously marginalized actors to conservation, while maintaining their existing governance systems and visions.
A more inclusive conceptualization of conservation may also mobilize conservation funding to actors and regions beyond PAs and recognized OECMs to support the conservation itself, without necessarily making them PAs/OECMs to be counted towards conservation targets. Such a shift would create space for different types of stakeholders and for new arrangements to contribute to conservation, allowing the full suite of existing forms of area-based conservation to exist, be recognized, and receive critical support.
The advancement of conservation research is also affected by what we consider as “conservation.” For example, considerable research efforts have been devoted to understanding the socio-ecological characteristics and effectiveness of PAs. Knowledge gained through this research has helped governments and practitioners to better design PAs, allocate resources, and address threats and conflicts.
In comparison, our knowledge of other diverse conservation governance is much more limited. A more inclusive conceptualization of conservation will inspire research to answer fundamental questions:
- What is conserved, where, and by whom?
- How have these governance systems evolved over time?
- How effective are different types of systems, and under what conditions?
By gaining knowledge on diverse types of area-based conservation, we can expand our conservation toolbox and ability to address different contexts and challenges in a rapidly changing world.
Some have expressed concerns that a more inclusive approach to conservation might allow ineffective sites to be recognized and counted towards national targets, inflating the total area conserved. However, recognizing the existence and relevance of those broader conservation systems to conservation does not equate to considering these sites as effective.
Rather, documenting them can provide essential baseline data for more rigorous evaluation of a conservation site’s effectiveness, filling critical gaps in our knowledge of conservation progress. Finally, this concern also highlights the inherent limitations of focusing solely on area-based targets to measure conservation progress.
After all, area-based conservation is the means, not the end, of conservation progress. Instead of trying to draw the perfect line between sites that count as conservation vs. not, an inclusive inventory can in turn help us to shift the emphasis to more pragmatic questions of what conservation systems work under which conditions, and how we can support the existing systems. These more nuanced questions get to the heart of what really matters for conservation success, such as rights recognition, enforcement, funding and capacity, and community empowerment.
All in all, we need to embrace an inclusive approach to recognizing and tracking area-based conservation. We advise researchers, donors, and decision-makers to consider and inventory a broader scope of area-based conservation and more diverse actors than they currently do. This approach can enhance research, conservation planning, funding allocation, and program strategies to achieve national conservation targets.
We also call for data sharing and compilation at local, national, and regional levels – complementing global databases – even if it takes a longer process before they are admitted by the official databases. A good example is RAISG (Rede Amazônica de Informação Socioambiental Georreferenciada, i.e. Georeferenced Amazonian Socio-Environmental Information Network), a regional network of all Amazonian countries that compiles data across diverse types of conservation areas inclusively from the bottom up. Instead of making top-down, centralized decisions on what counts as conservation, we should first understand who is governing the world’s lands and how, and therefore how best to support the world’s biodiversity stewards to realize their visions related to conservation and sustainable development.
An inclusive approach of tracking conservation contributes to the unfolding journey of conservation progress toward 2030 and beyond. The future of our planet and people depends on nothing less.
Yifan (Flora) He is an environmental politics scholar focusing on land and natural resource governance in the Global South, and is currently a PhD candidate at the Bren School, University of California, Santa Barbara. Dr. Siyu Qin is a geographer and conservation scientist with experience in land system science, conservation funding, and area-based conservation, and currently works at The Nature Conservancy. Dr. Rachel Golden Kroner is an interdisciplinary conservation scientist interested in transformative solutions to the global biodiversity, climate, and inequality crises, and she directs the Nature Positive oceans science team at WWF-US.
Related audio from Mongabay’s podcast: A discussion with biologist and author Tim Killeen, whose new book Mongabay is publishing in three languages to the website, dives into “everything you need to know about the Amazon if you want to save it,” he says, listen here:
Citation:
Qin, S., He, Y., Golden Kroner, R. E., Shrestha, S., Henriques Coutinho, B., Karmann, M., … Mascia, M. B. (2024). An inclusive, empirically grounded inventory facilitates recognition of diverse area-based conservation of nature. One Earth, 7(6), 962-975. doi:10.1016/j.oneear.2024.03.005
See related coverage:
Indigenous territories & peoples are key to achieving COP16’s 30×30 target (commentary)
‘Glimmers of promise’ for 30×30 goal as UN report calls for boosted efforts