1.Front section - IUCN

Building cultural support for protected areas through sacred natural sites 10
specific issues or conflicts, through the adoption of
belief systems and/or through participation in, or
imitation of, traditional practices, rituals and
ceremonies. Though human rights and environmental
groups have many times initiated alliances with I&T
peoples, the results have been mixed. Sometimes, as
relationships evolve and interests are more clearly
defined, it is found that the community of interest is
not sufficient to warrant maintenance of the alliance
over time.
Examples of how indigenous and
traditional peoples contribute to PAs
I&T peoples contribute to PAs, and to the
conservation of biodiversity in general, in three main
ways: sharing their traditional ecological knowledge;
participating in the management of established
protected areas; and maintaining biodiversity in
sacred natural sites outside of legally protected areas.
Modern groups sympathetic to I&T peoples’
worldviews, knowledge and rights contribute by
recognising the importance and value of these cultural
attributes, and advocating the integration of these
cultural inputs into the practices of the wider society.
Traditional environmental knowledge
(TEK)
I&T peoples have gathered an intimate knowledge of
their environments through thousands of years of
interaction with their surroundings, trial and error
management, and knowing, channelled from the
spiritual level. They have co-evolved with their
environment, modifying natural conditions, but
actively maintaining it in a diverse and productive
state, based on TEK, socio-cultural practices and/or
spiritual beliefs (Ramakrishnan, 2003). This
knowledge, and associated traditional management
practices, can provide an important complement to the
scientific knowing of modern society, and to its
application to the management of specific
environments in general, and PAs in particular.
TEK is particularly important because of the longterm
perspective it provides on ecosystem dynamics
based on ancestral interaction with habitats and
species. I&T peoples have also accumulated a vast
knowledge about individual plants and species, their
nutritional and medicinal properties, the use of their
fibres, their function within the ecosystem, and their
relationships to hydrological cycles. Many
sophisticated classification systems of I&T peoples
have been documented, some indicating more
complete taxonomies than western science (Oviedo,
2004).
Ramakrishnan (2003) notes that studies in India
have shown that sacred species are often ecologically
significant keystone species, thus linking the
ecological and the social at the process level. He
further notes that:
“such socially selected and ecologically important
keystone species, by their very presence in the
ecosystem, contribute to enhancing associated
biodiversity at ecosystem and landscape levels. This
interphase between ecological and social processes,
which contributes to ecosystem integrity, represents a
major gap in scientific knowledge that is understood
through TEK” (Ramakrishnan, 2001).
Groups and individuals from modern society play
an important role in accepting and applying TEK in
their own lives and work. For scientists, the challenge
is to decipher this knowledge, validate it and integrate
it into the modern scientific and technical paradigm
(Ramakrishnan, 2003). They can also be a catalytic
force in promoting the recognition and application of
this knowledge by natural resource management
agencies, private landowners and businesses.
Participation in management
I&T peoples can, and in many cases do, participate in
a variety of ways to support the management of PAs.
They can make significant contributions to the
development of the information base, decision
making, resource protection and management, public
education, and as staff. Sympathetic modern groups
can promote and facilitate the participation of I&T
peoples in management.
Development of the information base: Traditional
environmental knowledge, management practices,
and cultural perspectives of I&T peoples can provide
an important complement to the usual types of
information that are developed for decision making
for protected areas. However, as English and Lee
(2003) point out:
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