Emerging design principles for land conservation

What is it about?

Land conservation efforts such as parks, payments for ecosystem services, and community-based management underpin global biodiversity and ecosystem functioning but are also controversial. Environmental protection is often perceived to come at the expense of economic development or social equity, regardless of a growing body of research that indicates complex interactions between outcomes. In this article, we propose eight emerging design principles supported by decades of global research on land protection. These principles include tracing the mechanisms of change that enable reduced resource use and equitable benefit-sharing, explicitly prioritizing multiple goals, incorporating policy design features such as spatial differentiation and nested governance, and ensuring ongoing adaptive management based on credible monitoring. Our conclusions are based on conceptual analysis and narrative review of more than 200 studies on land protection.

Featured Image

Photo by Imat Bagja Gumilar on Unsplash

Photo by Imat Bagja Gumilar on Unsplash

Why is it important?

Land conservation can drive improvements in environmental conditions, local economic well-being, and social equity, but it can be difficult to achieve gains in all three dimensions. Our research identifies concrete steps towards multidimensional success, based on an extensive interdisciplinary body of research.