The conservation community has committed technical and financial assistance to low- and middle-income country (LMIC) governments to support the management costs associated with protected areas (PAs) as a means of conserving high biodiversity areas over the last few decades. Given other priorities, LMIC generally tend to have little capacity and weak governance for PAs, making external support imperative for conservation. In the past, funds provided to PAs have failed to provide long-term sustainable conservation outcomes, due to a focus on short-term finance for capital investment, with limited support for sustaining PA structures and institutions. Consequently, the conservation community has been…

An expected result of CMP’s 2017-22 Strategic plan is that “Key Organizations Try & Adopt good conservation practices”, which involves having key individuals successfully pilot the Conservation Standards (CS) within their organizations. There is however no readily available guidance on how to conduct such a pilot and how to follow it through to successful organization-wide adoption of the CS. This initiative aims to provide key individuals tasked with piloting the CS with guidance and a Theory of Change (TOC) that they can use as a road map to plan and implement the adoption of the CS within their organization. Material…

Although there is a broad assumption that using an adaptive management framework in conservation  leads to improved conservation efficiency, effectiveness, and impact, there is little robust and  consolidated evidence supporting this hypothesis. The Conservation Standards Effectiveness & Impact  Learning Initiative aimed to investigate what evidence exists to verify that increased adoption of “good”  conservation practice leads to more successful conservation projects. We developed a theory of change  documenting the intermediate results we were expecting to be achieved following the successful adoption of an adaptive management framework. Data collected in an…

Over the last few years, as the CMP Climate Guidance Working Group has developed Climate-Smart Conservation Practice, a few organizations in the Conservation Standards community have applied different parts of the guidance. Several organizations have experimented with different approaches to incorporating climate change into their situation models and using these models to brainstorm climate adaptation strategies. A few have tried to conduct climate scenario planning. The Climate Guidance Working Group has spent some time learning from their experiences through case studies development and learning group sessions. Here are the products that came from this initiative : Case Study 1 :…

The Swedish Agency for Marine and Water Management and FOS Europe have developed a framework and a 10-step method for tackling the big challenges in marine conservation. The framework contains ​definitions, guiding principles, and a methodology for design and management of networks of marine protected areas. Together with the step-by-step guidance, it helps to systematically reason through how much of what to protect, and how to protect it, in order to achieve the desired results within MPA networks. It provides tools for setting objectives for threat reduction based on the sensitivity of the targets to different threats, as well as for…

This draft “Toolkit” provides a series of “recipes” for “lighter” Conservation Standards (CS) approaches to different scenarios that teams typically encounter. The recipes link to tip sheets that offer practical ideas for how to develop key CS products using a lighter approach. The Toolkit and associated products are part of CMP’s Lighter Conservation Standards Initiative, which seeks to answer long-standing community requests for lighter, more accessible ways to get involved with the Conservation Standards. The full CS provides you with the best recipe for project management. However, teams don’t…

Nature-based Solutions (NbS) is an approach to addressing environmental and development challenges through protecting, maintaining, and enhancing ecosystem services. As part of CMP’s Collaborative Learning Initiatives, Australian NGO TierraMar researched how effectively NbS can benefit people and the environment. They interviewed people working in the NbS space, including many CMP members. Among other recommendations, the report highlights the need for more coordination and collaboration between NbS practitioners and donors.