'Keep it local' approach more effective than government schemes at protecting rainforest

Researchers from the University of Cambridge, the

a

University of East Anglia (UEA) and the Peruvian Ministry of Environment assessed the effectiveness of different approaches to conservation in the Peruvian Amazon between 2006 and 2011. They found that while all were effective at protecting the rainforest compared with non-protected areas of land, the areas protected by local and indigenous communities were on average more effective than those protected by the government.

However, the effectiveness of the conservation strategies also depended on what non-protected areas they were compared to, and the land use restrictions in place in the non-protected land. Future assessments of the impacts of different conservation strategies should therefore pay closer attention to land use restrictions in place in non-protected lands. The results are reported in the journal Scientific Reports.

Although the Amazon rainforest and its unique biodiversity are rapidly disappearing, little is still known about which protection mechanisms make a difference and how different conservation strategies compare.

The study looked at areas protected by the national government, indigenous communities or civil society and the private sector are, compared to non-protected areas and land destined for timber and mineral extraction. The researchers assessed each approach for how well it was able to curtail deforestation, defined as total forest cover loss, and forest degradation, defined as other human-induced disturbances, such as selective logging, logging tracks and fire.

Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-09-local-approach-effective-schemes-rainforest.html#jCp