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Exploring the effectiveness of integrated conservation and development interventions in a Central African forest landscape

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Abstract

Integrated conservation and development projects (ICDPs) have had limited success in addressing the often conflicting objectives of conservation and development. We developed a model with local participants to explore the trade-offs between conservation and development in southeastern Cameroon, where illegal hunting is regarded as the greatest challenge to conservation. We simulated the effects of different ICDP strategies by varying the degree of focus on antipoaching activities, anticorruption measures and direct development investments, and by varying the overall budget for such activities. Our outcome variables were numbers of selected wildlife species and household incomes. The model outcomes from the different scenarios were used to stimulate debate among stakeholders. Contributing to poverty alleviation while maintaining current animal population sizes will be extremely difficult and will require long-term external financial support. Devoting greater attention to improving local environmental governance emerged as the highest priority for this investment. We used the model outputs to inform some of the major policy makers in the region. Participatory modeling is a valuable means of capturing the complexities of achieving conservation at landscape scales and of stimulating innovative solutions to entrenched problems.

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Abbreviations

ICDP:

Integrated conservation and development project

NGO:

Nongovernmental organization

SE TOU:

South east technical operational unit

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), Jalan CIFOR, Situ Gede, Bogor Barat 16115, Indonesia and Nkolbisson, Yaoundé, Cameroon

    Marieke Sandker, Bruce M. Campbell & Terry Sunderland

  2. Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (UAM), Edif. de Biología, Módulo c/Despacho 208 Campus de Cantoblanco C/Darwin, 2, Madrid, 28049, Spain

    Marieke Sandker

  3. Charles Darwin University (CDU), Darwin, NT, 0909, Australia

    Bruce M. Campbell

  4. World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Jengi South Forest Programme, Yokadouma, Cameroon

    Zacharie Nzooh & Louis Defo

  5. Centre pour l’Education, la Formation et l’Appui aux Initiatives de Développement au Cameroun (CEFAID), P.O. Box 168, Yokadouma, Cameroon

    Victor Amougou

  6. World Conservation Union (IUCN), 28 rue Mauverney, 1196, Gland, Switzerland

    Jeffrey Sayer

Authors
  1. Marieke Sandker
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  2. Bruce M. Campbell
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  3. Zacharie Nzooh
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  4. Terry Sunderland
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  5. Victor Amougou
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  6. Louis Defo
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  7. Jeffrey Sayer
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Correspondence to Marieke Sandker.

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Sandker, M., Campbell, B.M., Nzooh, Z. et al. Exploring the effectiveness of integrated conservation and development interventions in a Central African forest landscape. Biodivers Conserv 18, 2875–2892 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-009-9613-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10531-009-9613-7

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