Four distinguished Plenary Speakers will address the meeting each day. Plenary Lectures will be held in the Large Sports Hall from 0900 to 0945, Monday 15 July to Thursday 18 July.

Monday 15 July

Sir Crispin Tickell GCMG KCVO, University of Kent at Canterbury, UK

Sir Crispin Tickell has enjoyed a distinguished career as a diplomat and was Britain's Permanent Representative to the United Nations. His personal interests range from climatology and paleontology to art in all its forms. During a career break at Havard University, he wrote his pioneering book on Climate Change and World Affairs (1976). Following his retirement from the Diplomatic Service, Sir Crispin has held many influential posts, including Warden of Green College Oxford, Chairman of the Darwin Initiative Advisory Committee, and Convenor of the Government Panel on Sustainable Development. He is currently Chancellor of the University of Kent at Canterbury.

Abstract

Tuesday 16 July

Professor Fikret Berkes, University of Manitoba, Canada

Fikret Berkes is a natural scientist whose research interests centre around common property resources and community-based management, with current emphasis on co-management, resilience, and traditional ecological knowledge. His books on Common Property Resources (1989) and Linking Social and Ecological Systems (1998) have greatly influenced thinking of both social and natural scientists about how humans interact with nature. Fikret Berkes was until 1996 Director of the Natural Resources Institute at the University of Manitoba in Canada, where he remains as Professor. Fikret Berkes' plenary will lead directly into the symposium on integrating people and conservation.

Abstract

Wednesday 17 July

Professor Richard Cowling, University of Port Elizabeth, South Africa

Richard Cowling is a botanist whose research covers one of the world's most botanically diverse regions, the Cape Floral Kingdom of South Africa. His current research focuses on the systematic and strategic conservation planning in the fynbos, succulent karoo and thicket ecoregions. His research interests also encompass resource economics, landscape ecology, and beetle-plant relationships. Richard Cowling is currently Research Professor in the Botany Department at the University of Port Elizabeth. His collaboration with Bob Pressey, in an exemplary conservation planning exercise, will lead directly into a symposium on the Cape Floral Kingdom.

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Thursday 18 July

Professor John H Lawton CBE FRS, Natural Environment Research Council, UK

John Lawton has enjoyed a distinguished career in academic research, most recently as Professor of Community Ecology and Director of the Centre for Population Biology at Imperial College. His research interests are wide and have spanned experimental and theoretical population dynamics, community ecology, ecological consequences of global environmental change, biological pest control, entomology and ornithology. Among his many publications has been Extinction Rates (1995) co-edited with Bob May. He is currently Chief Executive of the Natural Environment Research Council. and Vice President and Former Chairman, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds. John Lawton has also been nominated as recipient of the Society's La Roe Award for 2002.

Abstract

Abstracts

Sustainability and Conservation: Prospects for Johannesburg Crispin Tickell

The forthcoming World Summit on Sustainable Development is essentially about the ability of our society to cope with the results of the human impact on the earth: in particular human population increase, degradation of land, multiplication of wastes, pollution of rivers and oceans, shortages of fresh water, changes in the chemistry of the atmosphere, and destruction of other ecosystems and species. Advice from scientists suggest that human activity has caused the earth’s system to operate in unprecedented fashion, and that business as usual is not now a viable option.

For most people the problem is one of incompatible values, illustrated by short vested interest on one hand, and long term care for the earth on the other. So far progress has been unsatisfactory, and the prospects for Johannesburg do not look good. Change is usually brought about by leadership from above, pressure from below, or exemplary catastrophe. Johannesburg should be the opportunity for a decisive change of direction.

Re-thinking Community-based Conservation Fikret Berkes

The question of community-based conservation emerges at a time when the science of ecology and the various fields of applied ecology are in the midst of several conceptual shifts. One is the shift from reductionism to a systems view of the world, and a second is the shift to include humans in the ecosystem. A third is the shift from an expert-based approach to participatory conservation and management, as "the era of management is over". These three shifts are in fact related; they all pertain to an emerging understanding of ecosystems as complex adaptive systems in which human societies are an integral part.

In a heavily human-dominated world, it becomes increasingly important to search for ways to integrate people within ecosystems, rather than viewing them merely as "managers" or "stressors". However, there is little agreement on how this can be accomplished. The field of conservation ecology is in the middle of this debate, especially in regard to the question of the feasibility of community-based conservation. A number of interdisciplinary fields have in fact been pursuing elements of this question and have contributions to make to the debate. These fields include environmental history, environmental ethics, common property, and traditional ecological knowledge. The insights from these fields indicate that community-based conservation is not a panacea but is feasible under certain circumstances.

Planning for multiple biodiversity targets: a case study from the Cape Floristic Region Richard Cowling

Using the principles and practices of systematic conservation planning, we produced a plan that achieved conservation targets for biodiversity pattern and process in the species-and endemic-rich Cape Floristic Region of South Africa. Features targeted were: land classes; localities of Proteaceae and selected vertebrate species, comprising reptiles, amphibians and freshwater fish; population sizes for medium- and large-sized mammals; and, six types of spatial components to represent evolutionary and ecological processes. The plan was developed in several steps using C-Plan, a decision support system linked to a geographical information system. First we selected spatially fixed process components; then we selected areas required to accommodate targets for mammals; next we selected those planning units that achieved targets for land classes and Proteaceae and vertebrate species; and finally we selected planning units required to conserve entire upland-lowland and macroclimatic gradients. The result was a system of conservation areas comprising both intact and restorable habitat that would ensure the persistence and continued diversification of the region’s biota in the face of ongoing habitat loss and climate change. We assessed implementation priorities on the basis of conservation value and vulnerability to habitat loss, as well as socio-economic, political and institutional constraints.

Conservation biology: where next? John Lawton

Conservation biology as a science has made great strides over the last two decades. But despite impressive scientific advances, the threats to global biodiversity continue to grow. Conservation efforts have won many significant battles, but nobody can pretend that we are winning the war. And the depressing lists of threatened species and ecosystems are growing even before global climate change really starts to bite. So what is the future for conservation biology? Do we need even more science, or do we need science and something else? I will argue strongly that more conservation biology alone cannot win the war. Rather conservation biologists need to greatly increase collaborations with human aid and development agencies to create a fairer world; with international lawyers and economists to change those aspects of international trade that work against sustainable development; and with politicians of all persuasions to argue the case for conservation. And in our spare time there is still a lot of science to do. We need a society for conservation science, politics, economics and international law if we are to start to win the war. The prize is a more sustainable planet. Failure does not bear thinking about.

Last updated: 01.07.02