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| Conservation hunting and community sustainability
Organizers: Lee Foote, University of Alberta, Canada; Jon Hutton, Cambridge, England; Holly Dublin, IUCN (Lee.foote@ualberta.ca)
Subsistence and recreational hunting have historically been an influence on many large mammal species worldwide. Properly managed and regulated, recreational hunting can promote conservation goals of community stability and ecological sustainability by replacing more deleterious activities such as cultivation, intensive livestock production, and predator removal. Recreational hunting may be applied in scientifically and culturally informed ways to enhance biodiversity, meet human needs, and to increase the public's value, appreciation and awareness of nature. We will discuss conservation hunting (CH) within the context of case studies to show successes, failures, unintended consequences, and needs for best practices. Southern Africa and the North American arctic have become CH global leaders in recent years by slowing unsustainable wildlife trade, questioning indiscriminate predator reductions, and re-connecting local communities with wildlife use. Most of CH's innovative and adaptive progress has come from skilled wildlife managers/practitioners who have considered social needs as well as ecological settings. Unfortunately, neither a theoretical basis nor sufficient critical overview of CH has yet been advanced. Opposition to CH has emerged from (a) those categorically/morally opposed to killing animals, (b) some livestock producers, and (c) inflexible governance structures. Strong support has emerged from many ENGOs, academics, and community groups. We will follow case studies with an expert panel, engaging CH practitioners, and audience participation.
Global change challenges for biodiversity conservation in Africa – practical tools for planners and managers
Organizers: Phoebe Barnard and Guy Midgley, Global Change Research. Group, Cape Town. with assistance from Dr John Donaldson (Kirstenbosch Research Centre, Cape Town); Ms Mandy Driver (Bioregional Policy and Monitoring, Pretoria); Ms Zuziwe Jonas (Conservation Planning Division, Pretoria); Mr Barney Kgope (Global Change Research Group, Cape Town); Mr Brian Mantlana (Global Change Research Group, Cape Town); Dr Mathieu Rouget (Conservation Planning Division, Pretoria); Dr Kerry Sink (Marine Programme, Bioregional Programmes & Policy, Cape Town) (barnard@sanbi.org)
Most conservation biologists and agencies cite climate change, habitat loss and invasives as the key drivers of overwhelming biodiversity loss in the 21st century. But how will managers and planners in Africa minimize this loss? What can policymakers do to help their task? At the moment, nobody really knows. Practical advice is thin on the ground and poorly developed conceptually. Yet managers and planners are starting to feel despondent, aware that a big problem exists, but feeling powerless to stop or plan for it. This has serious implications for our attempts to conserve biodiversity, never mind to meet the 2010 target. This topic is crucial for the future of biodiversity, and indeed the field of conservation biology.
We intend to identify and prioritize advice, and where possible to identify concrete tools to help planners and managers at different scales. We will brainstorm the guts of a significant paper for a major scientific journal, but will also stimulate the development and dissemination of advice and tools in popular, user-friendly formats, including ‘toolkits' and articles in Conservation in Practice and development policy journals. We intend to build a community to take this discourse beyond SCB, and to work in an interdisciplinary way to develop such tools.
Participating in a conference: some advice for new-comers
Organizers: Malcolm Hunter, University of Maine; David Lindenmayer, Australia National University; Aram Calhoun, University of Maine (hunter@umenfa.maine.edu)
This workshop will provide advice to participants, especially students, on the fine art of attending a conference and making effective presentations. Topics to be covered will include: posters (how to fit 5,000 words into a square meter), oral presentations (how to fit 5,000 words into 15 slides), and networking (how to fit 5,000 words into a beer). In other words, we will take a light-hearted look at some ways to make attending a conference an enjoyable and productive experience.
This session is based on the presenters' new book: “Saving the Earth as a Career: Advice on becoming a conservation professional” published by Blackwell Science.
Partnerships for innovation in land restoration
Organizers: Gleb Raygorodetsky, The Christensen Fund; Erika Zavaleta, University of California (gleb@christensenfund.org)
Ecosystems the world over have been degraded through species loss and declines, biological invasions, changes in land use, and increased disturbance. To reverse – or even keep pace with – ongoing degradation will require revising conventional restoration strategies. There are promising innovative approaches that tackle degradation at the level of large landscapes and regions, by mobilizing a range of creative tools and collaborative approaches. These efforts are deeply interdisciplinary, including inter-regional, cross-cultural and cross-jurisdictional partnerships that capitalize on w landscape-scale ecological processes, such as species interactions, fire, and mobile herbivores. The proposed workshop will explore innovative approaches that build non-conventional alliances (e.g., through community participation, incorporation of local knowledge and practices, etc.) to improve outcomes of ecosystem restoration. This workshop will highlight original restoration efforts that, while diverse in their geography, coalesce in their approach. The unifying theme of these efforts is that the incorporation of traditional knowledge, community partnerships, and local institutions strengthens conservation and restoration outcomes by increasing the resilience of social-ecological systems at large scales. To reflect these common features, the proposed workshop will include presentations and follow up discussions that address the critical role of place-specific knowledge in tailoring restoration strategies to particular ecologies.
Policy workshops
Organizers: John Fitzgerald, Luigi Boitoni (SCB Policy Committee Chair), Reed Noss and Dominick DellaSala (SCB North American President and Policy Chair respectively) (luigi.boitani@uniroma1.it)
At luncheon workshops on July 2nd and 4th a panel of experts in policy and conservation biology and those who come to the workshops will discuss key policy opportunities and how we can help each other improve SCB's capacity to improve the policies of jurisdictions and other actors around the world. During the first session, we will introduce the policy chairs or leaders from each section and
- discuss the process for developing and coordinating SCB policy positions, the five policy priority areas chosen by the Board of Governors in February 2007, and opportunities for advancing SCB's global agenda and how we might work together to advance those;
- review sections' top policy priorities that may not fall within the global five and how we might help each other with those;
- review a list of resources for those interested in learning about and advancing the policy agenda and a policy survey that will be distributed to registrants in which we request information on their personal, chapter or working group priorities and capabilities and suggestions on what changes to seek and how.
- Preview a set of short presentations to be completed at the second workshop by experts in bringing conservation science to policy makers in effective, useful and timely ways.
During the first workshop, we will ask attendees to discuss with their colleagues at the conference who did not attend the first workshop how those others may be able to contribute to the policy process at the local, section or global level and to bring that information and any other insights they derive from the conference to the second workshop.
In the second workshop we will:
- Hear summaries of case studies and useful programs from a small set of science and conservation policy experts
- Hear reports from each section and each major chapter on:
- additional participants they are bringing to the policy program and
- any unique or innovative policy programs they have that can serve as examples for others
- Summarize some of the key points drawn from the survey of conference attendees.
- Present any changes adopted in the policy program or areas of emphasis by the Board of Governors.
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