Washington, DC — Delegates from over 170 countries are meeting this week in Durban, South Africa, to discuss the guiding principles of conservation and Protected Area management at the fifth World Parks Congress. While the idea of protecting the world's precious wild spaces and the plants and animals that live in them is widely accepted in principle, facts of life like rural poverty, civil conflict and insecurity and corporate agricultural or industrial expansion pose constant threats. The ten-yearly Congress, organised by the World Conservation Union, will focus on ways to make conservation goals coincide with the needs of human communities. The World Wildlife Fund's Vice-President for Endangered Spaces, William Eichbaum, has worked on conservation in the Congo basin, the Eastern Himalayas, New Guinea, the Galapagos Islands, Florida's Everglades and East Africa. Community-based conservation, in which the advancement and protection of human communities in protected areas is a central aspect of a park's overall biodiversity, is one of WWF's primary goals. He told allAfrica.com why it is the key to the future.
In terms of the big picture, why is this meeting important?
I think it's important to realize that this Congress happens only once every ten years and that it really sets the agenda for the way the professionals and those government and non-governmental organizations working in the parks area look to the next decade. The conclusions are extremely important because they provide us with benchmarks and guideposts for how we move forward.
We are in a crisis across the globe with respect to the loss of biodiversity and the habitats where wildlife live. Parks are a critical part of halting and reversing the trends that have precipitated this crisis. So this is an extraordinarily important Congress.
One of the main issues this Congress will attempt to tackle is the interaction between Protected Areas and their surrounding communities. Why does that matter?
Well, the Congress' theme is "Benefits Beyond Boundaries" and the whole idea is to explore the way that parks can benefit communities in and around parks. At WWF, this is an idea that we've been working on for more than a decade with the view that, for parks to be sustainable in the long term, they really need to embrace the values and needs of the people that live in and around them. We should not be approaching the issues of park management assuming that people should be excluded. One needs to both value their interests, needs, and resources as well as to allow them to benefit economically and socially from the parks themselves.
Can you provide any specific examples?
A good example of utilizing the fact that people have a historical, natural, or cultural connection to parks is found in Madagascar. There, in the Dry Spiny Forest, WWF, working with the government and local indigenes, has secured a process whereby their management of the forest that responds to their spiritual and cultural traditions is also recognized as being consistent with the national perspective that those forests are a component of an overall national biodiversity protection scheme. So a national objective is met in a context that is carried out and consistent with the values of the local people.
How would ecotourism factor into this new relationship?
Well, that's an example of the economic opportunities of the park. At WWF, we think that as park systems are developed they really can offer an opportunity for responsible tourism and that tourism can be a generator of jobs, income, and overall economic livelihood for the people who are in the area. I think governments are beginning to recognize this as well. In countries such as Mozambique and Gabon, major commitments are being made to national parks systems as a part of an economic development process based, in part, on growing the tourism visitation to these countries.
With the recent threat to biodiversity in Kruger National Park due to the overpopulation of elephants, there have been questions raised about how best to manage parks. The Congress' theme seems to refer directly to this concern about managing parks as though they were isolated islands. What needs to be done?
Without speaking directly to the situation in Kruger - the details and complexity of which I am not at all an expert of - I think that at the Congress we will definitely be addressing the issue of assuring that there is good management of parks. We want to make sure that parks are protective of the total natural resource mosaic that's in the park. That's a critical issue.
At the same time we want to be sure that the wildlife that's in the parks is managed in a way that doesn't do harm to surrounding communities. That's an important part of what needs to be addressed at this Congress, and also a high priority of WWF work in Southern Africa. Occasionally, as in the Quirimbas park which was recently created in northern Mozambique, local government communities have been included in the park in order to assure that the management plan takes issue with the relationship between people and wildlife so there can be an overall management scheme to deal with those conflicts.
Will the Congress address the issue of people-wildlife interaction in any specific manner?
At WWF, we are intensely involved in working with governments and local communities to build a system of marine protected areas along the African coast to protect the biodiversity and to manage fisheries better so that local people can continue to derive a livelihood from fishing and not be out-competed by industrial fishing. In the Congo, we've been working very hard with the government and with donors outside the Congo to define and fund the creation and management of a large system of protected areas.
In any given setting, the specifics have to be quite variable and tailored to the conditions and problems that exist. I think that what the Congress will do is enunciate in its final declarations a set of principles that ought to be adhered to and followed by park managers.
What are the general principles that you hope to see coming out of the Congress, apart from the need to integrate park management with local communities?
There are several broad themes that WWF is concerned with. Firstly, as parks are created in the future they should be located in places that maximize the protection of biodiversity. Second, less than one percent of the seas of the world are protected, and much conservation work needs to be done there. And thirdly, assuring the effective management and funding of parks systems is important.
We need to also worry about the global threats to parks. The agenda on this issue needs to focus on the effects of climate change and I think that this Congress is going to highlight the degree to which climate change and global warming are a real threat to the park systems that exists. The need to create future parks that are resilient to these threats will also be a concern.
But those are broad themes. With those will come more specific principles decided upon by the Congress, but I can't speculate as to what those will be.
Will the Congress address the involvement of the private sector with Protected Areas?
While I can't predict the details of how the Congress will address the issue, I think there are two broad dimensions. One is the need for greater governmental bilateral and multilateral funding. Of particular concern to us is the need to provide mechanisms for long-term, sustainable funding. That's where you involve the private sector. The question will be whether we can build stronger and more financially advantageous relationships between the private and public sector in a way that provides money for park management.
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There are some examples of this kind of relationship. WWF, for example, is working in Southeast Asia - the Philippines and elsewhere - with some private resort developers to ensure that as facilities are put in they are environmentally sound. Second, that there is a return from their economic activity that goes back to support the natural resource base, which is the reason why the resort is there in the first place. So these are beginning to happen in various ways and we want to be sure that it grows.
Do you foresee the possibility of another midterm Congress as there was between the 1992 Congress in Venezuela and this upcoming one?
Absolutely. We can't wait ten years to measure our success and the success of global institutions and civil society working on the principles outlined at the Durban Conference. We'll have to look at it midterm.
Has the "Caracas Action Plan" that emerged from the 1992 conference proved a success?
I think so. One of the major things we've achieved in the terrestrial environment is that more than 10% of land is now protected. While these protected areas are not everywhere they're supposed to be in terms of biodiversity, a lot of progress has been made. With a strong and positive message coming out of Durban we can continue and accelerate that progress, and that has to be done.
