No abstract

Tropical ecosystems host a large proportion of global biodiversity and directly support the livelihoods of many of the world's poorest, and often marginalized, people through ecosystem goods and services and conservation employment. The coronavirus pandemic has challenged existing conservation structures and management but provides an opportunity to re‐examine strategies and research approaches across the tropics to build resilience for future crises. Based on the personal experiences of conservation leaders, managers, and researchers from Madagascar during this period, we discuss the coping strategies of multiple biodiversity conservation organizations during the coronavirus pandemic. We highlight the vital role of local communities in building and maintaining resilient conservation practices that are robust to global disruptions such as the COVID‐19 crisis. We argue that the integration of local experts and communities in conservation, research, and financial decision‐making is essential to a strong foundation for biodiversity conservation in developing countries to stand up to future environmental, political, and health crises. This integration could be achieved through the support of training and capacity building of local researchers and community members and these actions would also enhance the development of strong, equitable long‐term collaborations with international communities. Equipped with such capacity, conservationists and researchers from these regions could establish long‐term biodiversity conservation strategies that are adapted to local context, and communities could flexibly balance biodiversity and livelihood needs as circumstances change, including weathering the isolation and financial challenges of local or global crises.

There is evidence to suggest that the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic may hamper our achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Here, we use non-human primates as a case study to examine the impacts of COVID-19 on the ability to achieve biodiversity conservation and management sustainability targets. We collected data through a survey of members of the IUCN SSC Primate Specialist Group from January to March 2022. Of the 93 experts that responded to our survey, we found that 39% had not been able to visit any of their field sites since March 2020, 54% said they had less funding available for their primate-related work, and only one out of ten said they had managed to achieve at least 76–100% of their planned primate-related work since March 2020. Six out of ten respondents (61%) felt that primate conservation efforts in protected areas were worse than before the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and one-third (33%) felt hunting was happening more frequently than before. This study provides evidence of the impacts of COVID-19 on progress towards achieving the SDGs, and provides practical lessons learned for biodiversity conservation efforts moving forward.

Tropiques, pp.7-15, 2010, 306(4). Photo 1. Le baobab produit généralement peu de fruits, mais de grande taille. La pulpe qui entoure les graines présente des qualités nutritives élevées. Sur ce cliché représentant A. rubrostipa, le faible effectif de fruits peut s'expliquer par la prédation de fruits non matures par le propithèque (Propithecus verreauxi). Photo J. Tassin. Seheno Andriantsaralaza