People-centered conservation
Redefining CI’s approach to enhancing human wellbeing in the context of safeguarding
biodiversity
Reflections by Mohamed Bakarr
(For Leadership Summit, Jan 7-10, 2008)
“Since its creation in 1987, the mission of Conservation International (CI) has been to conserve
our planet’s biodiversity and to demonstrate that human societies can live harmoniously with
nature. This mission is both science-based and people-centered, recognizing that conservation
must rely upon the soundest scientific underpinnings, while at the same time addressing the
needs and aspirations of communities.” Russ Mittermeier, Nature 405, 11 May 2000
“While there is an urgent need to safeguard protected areas, it is equally important to
demonstrate the economic benefits of protected areas for people living in and around them.
This will ensure a golden bridge connecting our cultural ethos and economic benefit, creating a
win-win situation for both people and protected areas. The Ministries of Environment and
Forests, Agriculture, Rural Development, Water Resources, Tribal Welfare, Tourism and Culture
along with their counterparts in states have to recognize their joint responsibility in developing
innovative strategies for biodiversity conservation.” Shri Atal Behari Vajpayee, Ex-Prime
Minister of India, 15 October 2003
Introduction
CI has established itself as a world leader in biodiversity conservation. CI’s scientifically derived
global framework of biodiversity hotspots and wilderness areas, and commitment to ‘zero
extinction’ has transformed conservation in a way that no other organization has ever done.
Our innovative approaches to work with a wide range of stakeholders (communities, private
sector, governments, etc.) and to mobilize conservation investment have helped to deliver
unprecedented results around the world. As the global development community continues to
grapple with the forces of global change (economic, social, biophysical, etc.), CI must strive to
align its priorities without loosing focus on our core business. At the heart of this alignment is
the need to better streamline CI overall approach to human welfare, one of our three pillars.
While CI has a strong tradition of engaging with communities to implement conservation, there
is need for innovation in ‘deepening’ and making such engagements more constructive and at
higher economies of scale. This will involve putting human communities at the heart of our
conservation approaches rather than as an ‘add-on’ token, which has often lead to negative
impressions of CI’s image in the field. A people-centered approach should be reflected in our
partnership principles, investment priorities, and our awareness/branding.
With respect to CI’s current global framework – hotspots and HBWAs – people-centered
conservation has two extremes: at one end are the indigenous communities with whom we
have successfully transformed vast areas of their territory into conservation areas of one form
or another. This would be the case in the Amazon and Congo Basin where are doing
fantastically well in helping indigenous communities secure and safeguard their rights over
forests, resulting in permanent protection of millions of hectares of prime habitats. At the other
extreme, we have the slash-and-burn farmers whose practices have resulted in vast areas of
degraded lands that they can no longer use for the most part, and therefore continue their
pressure on converting new areas. In between the two extremes exists all sorts of scenarios
related to the contexts where we work. And we can articulate our work along the continuum at
multiple scales, and involving multiple dimensions from protected area establishment to
enterprise, governance and policy.
Redefining an old paradigm
CI and the global biodiversity conservation community have come a long way in our effort to
safeguard biodiversity. We have
 dramatically increased the area of natural habitats in protected areas
 increased the precision necessary to target species level outcomes for extinction
avoidance
 increased the rights of indigenous communities over vast areas of natural habitats on
which they depend for their livelihoods
 raised the level of consciousness about the value of nature in the minds of decisionmakers
 influenced major investments in biodiversity conservation
So if our war is ensuring that biodiversity is secured in protected areas, I’ll say we are winning. If
our war is making sure that no species goes extinct, I’ll say we are well on track toward winning
as well. And if our war is to make sure that biodiversity conservation is mainstreamed at the
highest level of political discourse, I’ll say we are winning. But do these represent the totality of
wars we must fight as a global conservation organization? What about the war against
practices that predispose ecosystems to major threats? Practices such as misappropriation of
land and misuse of ecosystem services marginalize millions of poor people throughout the
world, and forces them to engage in destructive practices.
Given the growing dynamics of global change – from the biophysical (e.g. climate change), to
the economic (e.g. trade and globalization) and political (e.g. decentralization, civil conflict) –
there is pressure on the global conservation community to redefine environmental priorities
with an anthropological bias. It is all about people and society, because the fragility of the
world we depend on is suddenly becoming apparent in places where it was hitherto
questioned. As a result, new questions are being asked about the human side of everything we
do. Even though our work is not poverty alleviation or food security, that does not stop the
question about what difference we are making in the lives of poor people. Or what KBAs mean
for helping people to mitigate and adapt to climate change. Or how the protected areas we
help to set aside generate benefits that transform human societies. Merely answering these
questions (which we can do and are doing perfectly well in CABS) is not enough. We need our
conservation approaches embodying the principles that are informed by science, including the
relevant metrics and indicators that policy-makers can understand.
True to our mission, CI has human welfare as one of the three pillars in the current strategy.
And in addition, we have various initiatives that embody our commitment to working with
people – the indigenous community program, the conservation stewards program, the people
and protected areas program. And in the regions, local communities are being engaged in
various ways toward achieving conservation outcomes. So yes indeed, we are already doing
what is entailed in people-centered conservation. But that is not the issue here – rather, we
need to reflect on how our approach can be characterized in a manner that reflects evolving
aspirations of key stakeholders who are now concerned about global change.
Every conservation organization can lay claim on a paradigm that puts people at the heart of
conservation approaches. We are all aware of the blatant failures of ICDPs, which several major
organizations used as an excuse to engage people in biodiversity conservation (so-called
‘hijacking’ of biodiversity conservation). Despite major improvements in ICDPs over the last
two decades, successes with engaging people in biodiversity conservation are still few and far
between.
The leadership summit provides an excellent platform for us to engage in open discourse about
the underlying principles for a people-centered approach to biodiversity conservation. The
underlying assumption here is that CI’s success on delivering conservation outcomes can be
matched by a concomitant delivery of tangible benefits to society at multiple scales. In this
regard, CI needs an institutional framework to understand how its success with safeguarding
biodiversity can be aligned with aspirations of people to secure safe, healthy and sustainable
livelihoods. We will reflect on various examples from past and current initiatives across the
organization, and identify and evaluate important lessons that could feed into a innovative
framework for the entire organization. Key questions include:
What is CI’s strategy for conserving the abundance and diversity of life in recognition of our
focus on preventing extinctions, but with the understanding that goal has to be achieved
in the context of human well-being?
How are people and human economies engaged in delivering conservation outcomes?
What is the value-added to society for delivering those outcomes (i.e. what do the poor in
particular and society at large gain from the outcomes?
How are the benefits aligned with development priorities such as clean water, improved
health, food security, and risk mitigation associated with vulnerability to global change
impacts?
In addition, we will examine the possibility of defining clear metrics to assess our work in the
area of human welfare. This discussion will then feed into one about the need for innovative
partnerships that helps CI to mainstream human development needs in biodiversity
conservation. We will examine ways in which CI’s success with mobilizing and investing in key
partners to deliver conservation outcomes can be harnessed for a people-centered approach.
We will also examine key partners that could be crucial in facilitating such an approach at
multiple scales.
Finally, we will evaluate the implications for a people-centered for CI’s ongoing innovations in
branding and awareness. How do we ensure that the bit in our mission statement about
‘…demonstrating that people and nature can coexist’ is embedded in our corporate image?
How do we ensure that CBCs and field programs have access to the right tools and resources
for communication with people?
Issues for consideration in breakout groups
1 Science of engagement
2 Matrix management
3 Ecological and social adaptive management – fostering a culture of learning where
scientifically informed management strategies are iteratively evaluated and revised to improve
outcomes
4 Institutional partnerships
5 Human welfare outcomes in people-centered conservation (health and diseases; water
resource use; human-wildlife conflict) – metrics, indicators, and methods for impact
assessment and monitoring
6 Institutional frameworks for people-centered conservation (Suggestions from the Indigenous
People Program - Kristen Walker and Susan Stone)
People (indigenous and forest-dependent people and other local communities) are significantly
involved in nearly all of CI’s conservation strategies, yet there is no clear institutional body or
structure that defines, manages, monitors and adapts the approaches and tools endorsed or
promoted to achieve community related conservation outcomes.
Question: Do we need a coordinating mechanism (strategic team-primarily staffed from the
field?) to set directions for people centered conservation?
Some possible functions:










Clearly define CI’s vision and approach and comparative advantage in achieving
people centered conservation
Make recommendations for institutional best practice and policy (community
engagement approaches, rights and governance, indigenous people’s policy)
Bring institution-wide expertise and debate to the development, implementation
and monitoring of approaches and tools, (Conservation Agreements, Community Comanaged PAs and Community Conserved Areas, technology transfer, alternative
livelihoods)
Define operational guidelines fro our engagement with communities
Demonstrate actual benefits to people either financial or biodiversity related
Establish research priorities and facilitate a stronger feedback loop between
research and implementation related to human impacts on and benefits from
healthy eco-systems
Develop appropriate skill sets within CI staff and partners to deliver CI’s vision of
people centered conservation
Establish pool of experts to support regional program needs (mini-global teams)
Document and communicate CI’s people centered approach
Define resource needs and funding strategy