Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
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Enhancing regular contacts with communities in order to avoid conflicts
between conservation authorities and local communities that may result due
to poor communication of development and conservation policies.
(2010: 238)
Kideghesho also notes that increased personal contact can be a really important
factor in developing understanding and trust between wildlife staff and local people.
Activities involving media-based, community-orientated storytelling, image production
and filmmaking can also have significant beneficial effects, too (Blewitt, 2010b).
Conservation and development: REDD+ and the Yasuni
National Park
Conservation policies and practices are often designed to meet multiple goals -
poverty alleviation, economic diversity, climate change mitigation, biodiversity and
species protection. This multiple benefits perspectives, sometimes referred to as
win-win scenarios, sometimes lead to cycles of optimism and disappointment when
the best laid plans seem to falter or fail. Paul Hirsch
et al
. (2010) argue that a
realistic acknowledgement of possible losses and gains is essential and need not lead
to policy paralysis. Such a recognition, combined with popular faith in win-win
solutions, led to the development of the United Nations Collaborative Programme
on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing
Countries (UN-REDD Programme), the paramount problem being that tropical
deforestation is a major contributor to the increase in global greenhouse gas emissions
and losses in biodiversity, but forests and what lies underneath them may be of
immense economic value too. This invites a policy framework that invites trade-offs,
adaptive management procedures, continuous learning and the need for a multivariate
approach to valuing the benefits of nature and ecosystems. Such a policy framework
can, despite the win-win potentialities, lead to a contested terrain, including
worldviews, philosophical values, indigenous rights, scientific assessments, political
power and economic interests. Complexity is a fundamental characteristic of what
might at first glance seem a quite simple or obvious solution to a difficult problem.
The [UN-REDD Programme] was created in September 2008 to assist developing
countries to build capacity to reduce emissions and to participate in a future
REDD+ mechanism. For the purpose of this strategy, REDD+ refers to reducing
emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries; and
the role of conservation, sustainable management of forests and enhancement
of forest carbon stocks in developing countries.
The goal of significantly reducing emissions from deforestation and forest
degradation can best be achieved through a strong global partnership to create
a REDD+ mechanism under the United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change (UNFCCC). Such a partnership must be based on a commitment,
on one hand, by developing countries to embark on low-carbon, climate resilient
development, and on the other hand, by developed countries to provide predictable
and significant funding as an incentive for reduced forest-based carbon emissions.
(UN-REDD, 2011: 1)
