monitoring and enforcing payment for ecosystem services programs

This work was funded with the generous support of the American peoplethrough the Leader with Associates Cooperative AgreementNo.EPP-A-00-06-00014-00 for implementation of the TransLinks project.The contents of this report are the responsibility of the author and do notnecessarily reflect the views of the United States government.NO. 14; OCTOBER 2010M ONITORING AND E NFORCINGPAYMENT FOR E COSYSTEM S ERVICES P ROGRAMSL ESSONS L EARNEDAdrian Treves: University of Wisconsin-MadisonNelson Institute for Environmental Studies’ Carnivore Coexistence LabCatherine Schloegel: Fundación Cordillera TropicalPrivate landowners and other community members should be rewarded forprotecting ecosystem services and biodiversity locally. To be sustainable, suchincentive schemes must include training for community members to monitor andenforce compliance. An ongoing project in Ecuador is developing cost-effective,long-term monitoring strategies for a program aimed at protecting large andendangered animals. This brief summarizes the lessons learned.♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦SINCE 2006 FUNDACIÓN CordilleraTropical (FCT) has been developing aprogram to protect water and wildlife inthe Nudo del Azuay, southern SangayNational Park (SNP) in Ecuador. Thispayment for the protection ofenvironmental services (PPES) programrewards landowners who protect tropicalmontane forests from the upwardexpansion of the agricultural frontier andpáramo grasslands from increasedcultivation and road building.Like many protected areas in the tropics,the majority of SNP’s ostensibly publiclands are also the property of farmers andindigenous communities with rights pre-datingthe park’s establishment. A successful incentiveprogram, therefore, must include closecollaboration among local property owners,regional and national actors, and continuous localengagement in all aspects of the process. Successalso requires a monitoring plan that helps ensurethat conservation is occurring on the privatelands and protected areas involved. This briefoutlines the development and implementation ofa monitoring plan for the SNP PPES. The briefthen provides the lessons learned during thisprocess that have general applicable value forother incentive programs around the world.Lessons on monitoring and enforcing PES—1

How do we know it works?In 2009, FCT signed a cooperative agreementwith the Ecuadorian Ministry of Environmentto collaborate on the SocioBosque conservationincentive program. This program provideslandowners with an economic incentive toprotect areas of critical conservationimportance for the next 20 years. FCT assistslocal landowners attempting to enter theprogram. This has included visits to homes,assistance with applications, and, mostsignificantly, helping create a high-qualitygeo-referenced map of the conservation area(examples of such a property map are availableupon request from FCT.) FCT expects to haveenrolled 12 landowners and more than 500hectares of land by the end of 2010.Long-term conservation of high montane forestand páramo ecosystems requires rigorousmonitoring to assure that endangered wildlifeis protected within participating properties andthat the protected private properties formcritical habitat conservation areas. TheCarnivore Coexistence Lab (CCL) of theNelson Institute for Environmental Studies atthe University of Wisconsin-Madison hasworked with FCT in developing cost-effective,long-term monitoring strategies for large andendangered mammals, such as the Andeanbear. For example, CCL students havedemonstrated the efficacy of using motionactivatedremote cameras to detect largebodiedvertebrates and, most recently, toidentify and monitor individual Andean bearspersisting on private and communal properties(see LTC Brief 13).CCL joined FCT to train communityparabiologists and train FCT field staff to usestate-of-the-art, field-tested methods tomonitor the endangered Andean bearpopulation across 96,000 hectares of privatelands. Training included formal workshops, acourse that addressed human-wildlife conflicts(see LTC Brief 7), and a field course on how toinstall and monitor infra-red activated, remotefield cameras. Informal mentoring includestraining in project development andmanagement, and guidance and oversight ofthe development of a scientifically robuststudy design.In developing and implementing the trainingand monitoring strategy, FCT and CCLconsidered the following methods integral to asuccessful program.Engage the community in monitoring. FCTand CCL began training local communitymembers as parabiologists, or communitymonitors. The target date to have them fullytrained is mid-2011. At that time, the parabiologistswill become park employees working asliaisons between their communities and theSNP. The parabiologists include representativesfrom seven mestizo and indigenous communitieswithin or near the park. Three are bilingualQuichua-Spanish speakers. The goal is toensure that local community members becomefuture leaders in national park managementand biodiversity monitoring.Engage landowners and the broadercommunity. We focused on betterunderstanding landowner tolerance andperceptions to threatening wildlife, and thenused these insights to guide interventions. Amonetary incentive, such as that provided bySocioBosque, may form part of an effectivestrategy to protect wild lands in southern SNP.However, monetary incentives are not likely tochange deeply held local perspectives aboutthreats posed by wildlife.Effective conservation must adequatelyrespond to the costs (both monetary and toquality of life) suffered by landowners whoface wildlife threats to domestic animals andother property. We used short courses,community meetings, workshops, and smallgroupmeetings to share information andtransfer technical skills on how to respondeffectively to threatening wildlife.Lessons on monitoring and enforcing PES—2

Use the right tools and disseminate resultsto show that the methods work. Thecommunity parabiologists monitor biodiversityon private lands within SNP using indirect signsurveys within forest and páramo, and remotecamera-traps located in forest. In 2010 CCLtransitioned from field testing monitoringmethods and identifying endangered Andeanbears on private lands to a training role.Training included teaching local communityparabiologists and FCT field staff site-specificEvidence of unique animals on private landcan lead to landowners helping in effortsto protect wildlife.Photo by Becky Zug.and field-tested methods to monitor wildlife,particularly the Andean bear. We sharedknowledge and skills with a wide array ofaudiences: local organizations, universitystudents, members of the local press,international donors, and the general scientificcommunity. Most critically, the informationgenerated has been shared with participatinglandowners For example, sharing photos ofwildlife on a landowner’s land can create itsown incentive for that landowner to conserveand protect wildlife.Lessons learnedWith the 10 community monitors trained in2009-2010, and a further 18 University deAzuay students and FCT staff trained by CCLin methods for understanding and managinghuman-wildlife conflicts, the work has yieldedseven lessons applicable to any conservationincentive program.Combine external technical knowledge withlocal expertise at every stage. Just as outsideexperts rarely understand the local context andthe feasibility of different methods for fieldmonitoring, local experts require technicalinput from an outside perspective. Thissynergy should exist not only at the trainingand design phases of a project but throughoutto assure the high quality of monitoring data,continued sociopolitical acceptance andfeasibility of the field activities, and effectivedissemination of methods and results locally,regionally, nationally, and internationally.CCL and FCT achieved this continuouscomplementary mix of expertise as follows.CCL brought lessons, methods, equipment,and funding from several disciplines andcountries via quarterly, intensive training andplanning visits. FCT supported a pair oftrained biologists to transfer knowledge tocommunity monitors, contributed funding fromseveral international and national sources, andprovided weekly administrative, financial, andpersonnel oversight. Local communitymonitors (parabiologists) contributed theirknowledge of the people, wildlife, andlandscape in continuous surveillance andbimonthly, systematic surveys of theirpredetermined patrol routes.Build teamwork among communitymonitors. The nature of the patrol work inremote areas with little interaction among teammembers necessitates focused team building.Community monitors patrol in teams of two,covering more than 70,000 hectares.Community monitors use field notebooks andGPS units to maintain high-quality records ofLessons on monitoring and enforcing PES—3

wildlife signs (see Figure 1). Each communitymonitor pair works in a unique and remotefield location with little interaction among thedifferent crews. As such, weekly meetingsbetween park guards and FCT staff facilitatecommunication, rapid response to equipmentproblems, and collaborative problem-solving.Train community monitors in skills theymay need in the field and the office. Ideallycommunity monitors will go on to careers inmonitoring PES programs and possibly train orsupervise others performing such tasks.Therefore community monitors must be seenas the long-term capacity of the community toperpetuate monitoring. FCT training of thecommunity monitors has included:• 13,520 hours of patrol in four subwatersheds(see Figure 1)• 3,520 hours of training and capacitybuilding via formal workshops onhydrological monitoring, herpetofauna andlarge mammal identification, and skillbasedtraining on the use of scientificequipment, professional skills, andmanagement of a microenterprise.Figure 1. Eleven months of patrolling shown by GPS locations taken by ten community park guards within SangayNational Park. Ecuador.Lessons on monitoring and enforcing PES—4

• 80 hours of environmental education in localschools• 64 hours of patrol for illegal fishing in theDudas sub-watershed• weekly meetings to provide ongoing trainingin field-based biology and monitoringskills, including the use of GlobalPositioning Systems (GPS), photographyusing point-and-shoot digital cameras,computing skills including data and photodownload, word-processing, leadership, andenvironmental education.Maintain the links between communitymonitors and their home communities,especially participating landowners. Thecommunity monitors serve continuously asambassadors for the project, the PPESprogram, and the communities they represent.Although FCT/CCL-trained communitymonitors have little formal education (mosthave completed school through 6 th grade), theyhave far exceeded expectations by serving asliaisons between the park and communities,providing on-site education about the park toresidents, school children, and visitors, anddemonstrating keen interest in research andmonitoring projects.In May 2010, CCL and FCT designed and leda two-week short course entitled “Balancinghuman needs and carnivore conservation” for15 undergraduates from the University ofAzuay in Cuenca, Ecuador (co-financed by theFulbright Senior Specialist Program). Anovernight field excursion allowed participantsto learn camera-trapping techniques in situ andenhance their understanding of bear attacks onlivestock via interviews with local landowners.In August 2010, FCT began traininglandowners and their families how to design,install, and maintain deterrents and preventivemeasures against bear attacks on dairy cattle.Reach beyond the project area to learncontinuously and share lessons widely. Aproject team must learn to make mid-coursecorrections, add new insights to improveefficiency and solutions, and anticipateproblems. In our project, FCT providesguidance and training to colleagues at nearbyCajas National Park in the Azuay Province,renowned bear expert Armando Castellaños atFundación Espiritu del Bosque in Ecuador, andthe Ecuadorian Ministry of Environment. Thework is further disseminated to the regionalwater fund, FONAPA, which is developing awatershed-level biodiversity and hydrologicalmonitoring plan. CCL has reported on projectgoals and methods to colleagues in Ecuadorand beyond with dozens of public talks andpublications (for examples, see http://www.nelson.wisc.edu/people/treves/Publications.html).This outreach has included the WildlifeConservation Society-Ecuador, ConservationInternational-Ecuador, and the EcuadorianMinistry of the Environment.Combine social scientific monitoring withbiodiversity monitoring to ensure on-thegroundconservation results. CCL issupporting FCT in social scientific research onlandowners’ changing attitudes to biodiversity,management interventions, incentive schemes,and reprisals against wildlife. The surveys areintended to provide a baseline by which tomeasure changes in perception and attitudeover the life of the project. CCL also is testingnew methods for non-invasive monitoring ofendangered vertebrates. Our partnershipcreates an exceptional opportunity to traincommunity monitors to understand anddeploy advanced monitoring equipment,such as remotely triggered camera traps, andfield devices for the passive collection of hairfor DNA.PES schemes must reliably deliver economicincentives to private landowners.When SocioBosque approached FCT with aproposal to work together, this helped createlong-term stability with the promise that theMinistry of Environment will provide fundingfor the duration of 20-year conservationcontracts. However, there have been problemsdelivering incentives.Lessons on monitoring and enforcing PES—5

FCT pre-enrolled 3000 hectares owned by 140beneficiaries on 39 parcels to participate in theSocioBosque program. As of May 2010 (theend of the most recent enrollment period),SocioBosque accepted just two arealandowners to participate in the program.Large-scale participation in the SocioBosqueprogram has been inhibited by a myriad ofissues. For example, initially SocioBosquefocused solely on forest conservation,excluding other ecosystems. However, in June2009, the Ministry of Environment expandedthe program first to include páramos and then,in March 2010, landowners within protectedareas. Nevertheless, program designers haveyet to accept the majority of landowners in theSNP region because they lack a geo-referencedmap of the property and reference to the totaltitled area (in hectares).Furthermore, SocioBosque must resolve theincompatibility between regional and nationalland titling agencies. A poorly organizeddecentralization of land titling to provincialleaders led each of the 24 provinces to titleland in a distinct manner. Ultimately, someprovinces’ land titles remain unrecognized bythe regional capital.The short-term result is that the SocioBosqueprogram continues to value overall number ofhectares enrolled without necessarily creatingcontiguous conservation blocks linkingnational parks with their buffer zones orimportant habitat for wide-ranging wildlife.Similarly, a lack of direct benefits has slowed theacceptance of a private, eco-label scheme,Wildlife Friendly Certified. To date, only AllThings Alpaca has been certified in the projectarea. No other property owners have developedvalue-added local products that could potentiallyapply for Wildlife Friendly certification.The critical lesson is that when PES fundsdon’t flow, other incentives must be providedin the interim. While FCT itself cannot paypre-enrolled landowners, it is able to helplandowners mitigate the costs of livingalongside damaging wildlife. FCT and CCLsponsored a workshop that brought together 52private landowners to discuss property damageby wildlife and non-lethal interventions tomitigate those losses. Five of those landownersare working with FCT to plan and implementnon-lethal deterrents, which will prevent theendangered Andean bear from attacking dairycattle on remote pastures. While PES funds areslow in flowing to participating landowners,this local collaboration promises to offset costsof conservation for environmentallyconcernedlandowners.♦♦♦♦♦♦♦♦Published by the Land Tenure Center. Comments encouraged:Land Tenure Center, Nelson Institute of Environmental Studies,University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI 53706 USAkdbrown@wisc.edu; tel: +608-262-8029; fax: +608-262-0014http://www.ies.wisc.edu/ltcLessons on monitoring and enforcing PES—6