DEFORESTATION AROUND THE WORLD - India Environment Portal

Preserving Biodiversity and Ecosystems: Catalyzing Conservation Contagion
the creation of community-based organizations to manage or contribute to the project.
This also implies a high level of community empowerment. In Assam, India, the Manas
Biosphere Reserve is now being protected by a network of 14 community groups
(Horwich et al, 2010, Horwich et al., 2011). In this regard it is notable that the
communities played a significant role in having UNESCO recently remove the “World
Heritage Site in danger” listing. In the cloud forests of Peru, the Yellow Tailed Woolly
Monkey Project has been stimulating community groups to create community reserves
under Peruvian law. In Papua New Guinea, the Tree Kangaroo Conservation Program has
created a community group that is a federation of over 26 clans. The second point is that
community groups have stimulated or contributed to the creation of new protected areas
or act as complementary protectors of public and private lands. Thirdly, communities can
play a major role in regional or landscape protection as is occurring in the Golden Langur
Conservation Project in the Manas Biosphere Reserve in Assam, India (Horwich et al.
2010), the Tree Kangaroo Conservation Program in Papua New Guinea (Ancrenaz et al,
2007) and what is evolving in the Yellow Tailed Woolly Monkey Project in the cloud forest
of Peru (Shanee et al., 2007).
Table 1. Updated list of Community Conservation projects with selected information.
Our community-based model, comprised of nine social stages, progresses as follows: (1)
initial contacts with community leaders and elders to catalyze informal communication with
village inhabitants, providing opportunities to openly and candidly discuss the significance
of their resources and benefits to be gained from cooperative and participatory initiatives for
conservation of their natural resources fostering (2) informal relationship-building in
indigenous and other local communities leading to (3) participatory education providing (4)
a window of opportunity for local conservation leaders to emerge (5) who invoke support
from others, in our cases, the majority of villagers fostering (6) development of a formal
infrastructure and plans within the possibilities of each community context. Eventually, (7)
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