Does Monitoring Matter? A Quantitative Assessment of Management Decisions from Locally-based Monitoring of Protected Areas

Abstract

Biodiversity monitoring is criticized for being insufficiently relevant to the needs of managers and ineffective in integrating information into decision-making. We examined conservation management interventions resulting from 2½ years of monitoring by 97 rangers and 350 community volunteers over 1 million hectares of Philippine protected areas. Before this monitoring scheme was established, there was little collaboration between local people and park authorities, and park monitoring was restricted to assessments of the quantity of extracted timber. As a result of the scheme, 156 interventions were undertaken in terrestrial, marine and freshwater ecosystems. In total 98% of these interventions were meaningful and justified, 47% targeted the three most serious threats to biodiversity at the site, and 90% were implemented without external support, suggesting that the interventions were relevant and could be sustained over time at the local level. The mean time from sampling to decision-making was only 97 days, probably because 82% of the interventions were initiated by the same people and institutions that had compiled the underlying data, bypassing potential government bureaucracy. Many of the interventions were jointly undertaken by community members and the management authorities or consisted of local bylaws in support of park management. As a result of the monitoring, indigenous resource use regulation schemes were re-established with government recognition in several parks. The monitoring led to more diversified and realistic management responses on the part of the authorities, including a more socially acceptable and effective approach to enforcement. Of the four field monitoring techniques used, the most participatory one generated more interventions aimed at ensuring a continued resource supply for local communities (v 2 3 =69.1, p < 0.01). Although this suggests that the interest of community members is associated with their possibilities to influence the flow of ecosystem goods and services, the 156 interventions targeted, directly or indirectly, all known globally threatened species of mammals, birds and butterflies in the parks.

Conserving socio-ecological landscapes: An analysis of traditional and responsive management practices for floodplain meadows in England

“…This includes presumption towards a 'minimum intervention' approach to management as well as monitoring and assessment activity that provides a partial view of landscape value and status, and that is of limited value for the purposes of responsive landscape management (Sheil, 2001;Danielsen, 2005;Legg and Nagy, 2006). In combination with firmly held views regarding past management practices (Dinnie, 2015) such framings also influence interpretation of evidence regarding past management under the traditional management approach.…”

“…Debates revolve around not only clarity of survey design, aims and objectives, but also the relevance of much biodiversity monitoring to management decision-making (Danielsen et al, 2005), as well as more fundamental questions of what kind of data should be collected and the utility of expert versus experiential data (Fazey et al, 2006). Some authors have noted the need to close and tighten the adaptive management cycle (Uychiaoco et al, 2005;Carruthers et al, 2013), although the impacts of management operations are not always well understood (Crofts and Jefferson, 1999;Freese et al, 2014).…”

Monitoring Important Bird Areas in Africa: Towards a Sustainable and Scaleable System

“…Institutionalisation should help ensure that results are indeed translated into management practice and policy reform (see Danielsen et al 2005 (this issue)). However, this remains a challenge -as it is for any monitoring system.…”

“…Monitoring should be more sustainable when it involves very simple, inexpensive methods, put into effect by local communities or government staff (Danielsen et al 2003;Gray and Kalpers 2005 (this issue); Topp-Jørgensen et al 2005 (this issue)). Such approaches may also simplify and strengthen the link between data collection and effective local management action (see Andrianandrasana et al 2005;Danielsen et al 2005;Rijsoort and Jinfeng 2005;Uychiaoco et al 2005 (this issue)). …”

Community-Based Participatory Research Helps Farmers and Scientists to Manage Invasive Pests in the Ecuadorian Andes

“…Community-based monitoring has therefore become widespread in the last few years, documenting many outcomes related to biological resource management (see Calheiros et al 2000;Olsson and Folke 2001;Curtin 2002;Lawrence 2002;Danielsen et al 2005 and related articles in the same issue). Surprisingly, community-based monitoring has not been a conspicuous focus for invasive pest species in developing nations, an increasing threat to the sustainable development in the tropics.…”