Collaborative management partnerships strongly decreased deforestation in the most at-risk protected areas in Africa since 2000

Collaborative management partnerships (CMPs) between state wildlife authorities and nonprofit conservation organizations to manage protected areas (PAs) have been used increasingly across Sub-Saharan Africa since the 2000s. They aim to attract funding, build capacity, and increase the environmental effectiveness of PAs. Our study documents the rise of CMPs, examines their current extent, and measures their effectiveness in protecting habitats. We combine statistical matching and Before-After-Control-Intervention regressions to quantify the impact of CMPs, using tree cover loss as a proxy. We identify 127 CMPs located in 16 countries. CMPs are more often located in remote PAs, with habitats that are least threatened by human activity. Our results indicate that, on average, each year in a CMP results in an annual decrease in tree cover loss of about 55% compared to PAs without CMPs. Where initial anthropogenic pressure was low, we measure no effect. Where it was high, we see a 66% decrease in tree cover loss. This highly heterogeneous effect illustrates the importance of moving beyond average effect size when assessing conservation interventions, as well as the need for policy makers to invest public funds to protect the areas the most at risk.

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Publication Details

Journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Published
2024-12-30
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2411348121
Citations
8
Primary Topic
Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
2.26

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article

Collaborative management partnerships strongly decreased deforestation in the most at-risk protected areas in Africa since 2000

Mujon Baghai, Philippe Delacote, Peter A. Lindsey, Giulia Vaglietti et al.
8 citations
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
2.26
article

Collaborative management partnerships strongly decreased deforestation in the most at-risk protected areas in Africa since 2000

Mujon Baghai, Philippe Delacote, Peter A. Lindsey, Giulia Vaglietti, Sébastien Desbureaux, Ashley Robson, Antoine Leblois, Ilyasse Kabore
article en
8 citations

Abstract

Collaborative management partnerships (CMPs) between state wildlife authorities and nonprofit conservation organizations to manage protected areas (PAs) have been used increasingly across Sub-Saharan Africa since the 2000s. They aim to attract funding, build capacity, and increase the environmental effectiveness of PAs. Our study documents the rise of CMPs, examines their current extent, and measures their effectiveness in protecting habitats. We combine statistical matching and Before-After-Control-Intervention regressions to quantify the impact of CMPs, using tree cover loss as a proxy. We identify 127 CMPs located in 16 countries. CMPs are more often located in remote PAs, with habitats that are least threatened by human activity. Our results indicate that, on average, each year in a CMP results in an annual decrease in tree cover loss of about 55% compared to PAs without CMPs. Where initial anthropogenic pressure was low, we measure no effect. Where it was high, we see a 66% decrease in tree cover loss. This highly heterogeneous effect illustrates the importance of moving beyond average effect size when assessing conservation interventions, as well as the need for policy makers to invest public funds to protect the areas the most at risk.

Proceedings of the National Academy of SciencesVol. 122(1)
Griffith University (AU), Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique (FR), Université Le Havre Normandie (FR), University of Cape Town (ZA), Université de Montpellier (FR), AgroParisTech (FR), Institut National de Recherche pour l'Agriculture, l'Alimentation et l'Environnement (FR), Energy Transitions (United Kingdom) (GB), Wildlife Conservation Society United Kingdom (GB), Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (IT), Institut Agro Montpelier (FR), Bureau d'Economie Théorique et Appliquée (FR), Center for Environmental Economics - Montpellier (FR), Equipe d’Economie Le Havre Normandie (FR), University of Pretoria (ZA), Université de Lorraine (FR)
Recherches Avancées sur la Biologie de l’Arbre et les Ecosystèmes Forestiers, Agence Nationale de la Recherche
Partnerships for the goals
Openalex Percentile: Top 12%
Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
2.26
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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