Supporting country action on the CBD programme of work on protected areas

PoWPA Activity 4.2.1

Develop and adopt appropriate methods, standards, criteria and indicators for evaluating the effectiveness of protected area management and governance, and set up a related database, taking into account the IUCN-WCPA framework for evaluating management effectiveness, and other relevant methodologies, which should be adapted to local conditions.

Information on the status and trends of biodiversity within protected areas is the objective of “outcome” monitoring in the process of management effectiveness evaluation (Goal 4.2). The development of biodiversity conservation targets (under Activity 1.1.1) should help guide monitoring these “outcomes”, i.e. the ecological integrity or biodiversity health of a protected area or system. The CBD framework on global level indicators adopted in Decision VII/30 (http://www.biodiv.org/decisions/default.aspx?m=COP-07&id=7767&lg=0) will help to improve consistency across regions and protected areas, allowing the aggregation of information collected through protected area monitoring programmes, and comparisons at different levels and different times. Understanding the cause-and-effect linkages between management and outcomes is critical to identifying how management can be improved: i.e. in driving adaptive management strategies. Assessment is only worth carrying out if it is linked in turn to practical plans to address any problems or management weaknesses that are discovered through assessment.

A number of monitoring and assessment systems have been developed. These include assessments undertaken at a protected area system level such as WWF’s RAPPAM methodology (http://www.panda.org/about_wwf/what_we_do/forests/our_solutions/protection/tools/rappam/index.cfm ); a review of Finland’s parks (http://www.metsa.fi/mee/index.htm ); and State of the Parks assessment and reporting in New South Wales in Australia (http://www.nationalparks.nsw.gov.au/).

The World Commission on Protected Areas has developed a framework for developing management effectiveness assessment methodologies (Hockings et al., 2006).  While any particular assessment methodology will have an array of indicators, the framework identifies the following elements for categorizing these indicators: 

• Context – protected area significance, threats and policy environment;
• Planning – protected area design and planning;
• Inputs – the resources needed to carry out protected area management;
• Processes – the way in which management is conducted;
• Outputs – the implementation of management programmes, actions and services;
• Outcomes – the extent to which objectives have been achieved

There are many different approaches to assessing protected area management effectiveness, but these generally fall into four categories (Ervin, 2007):

• An in-depth evidence-based approach uses the results of monitoring and stakeholder surveys to assess the degree to which management actions have achieved management objectives.  Such assessments typically involve the creation of a detailed baseline of key desired outcomes, and the assessment is designed to measure changes in these outcomes over time (see, for example, Parks and Wildlife Service, 2004).
• A system-wide peer-based approach includes most or all of the protected areas within a given system (for example Ervin, 2003b; Goodman, 2003).  Participants assess a range of indicators related to key threats and critical management needs, typically in participatory workshops with peer review by protected area managers and others to reduce biases. 
• A rapid scorecard-based approach uses a scorecard to elicit expert opinions about protected area management (for example Stolton et al., 2003, Corrales, 2004), usually with a set of four or five pre-defined thresholds for each indicator.  Such assessments can be very rapid, and require few resources to implement. 
• A categorical assumption-based approach draws on available data and develops assumptions to determine potential management effectiveness (see for example Supples et al., 2006).  Usually there is little interaction with field staff to corroborate results, but there is often some review of the assumptions by administrative staff.  This approach, which applies to an entire category of protected areas, should not be treated as equivalent to a more comprehensive assessment.

The choice of assessment approach and methodology will depend on several factors, including the available time, financial and human resources, and the specific purpose of the assessment. In general, an in-depth, evidence-based approach is best suited for a comprehensive assessment of a few important protected areas and for setting thresholds for adaptive management, a site-level scorecard-based approach for tracking progress related to conservation investments, a system-level approach for developing system-wide strategies, policies and capacity needs, and a categorical approach for a cursory assessment of the major management gaps within a protected area system (Ervin, 2007).  In many cases, planning teams may want to use a mix of approaches within a single protected area system, and adapt existing indicators and methodologies to suit local circumstances.

Site based assessments vary from use of a simple scorecards such as the World Bank/WWF Tracking Tool (http://www.panda.org/downloads/forests/areprotectedareasworking.pdf ) (used to measure progress in 200 protected areas), the Nature Conservancy’s Parks in Peril scorecard (http://www.parksinperil.org/wherewework/ ) through to more detailed site-based monitoring and assessment programmes (http://www.enhancingheritage.net ). The WCPA Framework for Assessing the Management of Protected Areas can be found at (http://www.iucn.org/dbtw-wpd/html/bp14-evaluatingeffectiveness/cover.html ).