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Effective Conservation Program (ECP) A framework summary for the Hawaiʻi Conservation Alliance Introduction: A major goal of the Hawaiʻi Conservation Alliance (HCA) is to facilitate the effective conservation of Hawaiʻi's native ecosystems in terrestrial, aquatic, and marine realms. We share the goal of consistently and comprehensively tracking our conservation progress, identifying current and future needs, and focusing our collective efforts more effectively through this approach. This framework summary defines Effective Conservation (EC), provides criteria for assessing effectiveness in a geospatial manner, and discusses the potential uses of this approach for purposeful, coordinated improvement in our existing areas of protection and management, as well as identification of specific geographies that can benefit from our joint efforts to expand the geography of conservation in Hawaiʻi via increased level of protective designation, management, and stakeholder support where they are currently lacking or insufficient. What is Effective Conservation? Effective Conservation is defined here as a combination of conditions that together ensure that native ecosystems and species have a maximal chance of maintaining their viability into the future. The main conditions are 1) presence of viable conservation targets, typically ecosystems and/or species; 2) protective designation applied to an area with the intent to limit incompatible land uses and enable or facilitate conservation management; 3) active management to prevent/mitigate threats, and enhance viability of ecosystems and species; and 4) stakeholder involvement and support of conservation efforts. EC is said to be in effect in a place when an important conservation area receives protective designation that enables active management that mitigates threats and yields improvement in viability of the conservation targets in the area. The long-­‐
term success of such management depends strongly on ongoing stakeholder involvement and support, which in turn feeds back into long-­‐term management, honoring of protected designation, and active care of the conservation targets. Put another way, EC is achieved when: Long-­‐term, protective designation and threat management, supported by stakeholders, results in a track-­‐record of stable or expanding native biodiversity and ecological processes in an area of conservation significance. When illustrated as overlapping circles in a Venn Diagram, EC looks like the combined 4-­‐part overlap area (Figure 1). Figure 1: the Venn Diagram of Effective Conservation I. Presence of viable conservation targets Our conservation efforts are typically applied to those areas that contain species and ecosystems that we value. The first step in effective conservation is identification and mapping of those important areas. The HCA recognizes that native species of Hawaiʻi, and the ecosystems that they form, are largely restricted by biogeography to the Hawaiian archipelago and its surrounding marine waters. There are some indigenous species that may include a range extending beyond the archipelago, and there are even non-­‐native, but culturally important species, such as Polynesian Introductions, that can be acknowledged, mapped, protected, and managed. In large measure, our endemic and indigenous species and ecosystems, form the consensus conservation targets for HCA. Through various efforts, we have fairly good tracking of the extent of terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems and species, and a steadily improving ability to document important marine conservation targets. The latest mappings of such targets creates maps such as seen in Figure 2. This is the starting arena for EC. The role of restoration is to expand the extent of the arena via active reintroduction of species into appropriate range. Figure 2: Kāne‘ohe Bay, O‘ahu. Map of intact terrestrial vegetation, continuous perennial streams, and selected marine ecosystems. II. Protective designation The designation of a particular status onto an area of land or ocean is one way to acknowledge a need to protect and manage the conservation targets of that area. Designation typically dedicates a land to a particular intended use or set of uses, for example, as a public park for recreation purposes, as a sanctuary for protection of wildlife, or a forest reserve with mixed commercial, recreational, and resource protection intent. Typical designations in Hawaiʻi include national parks, wildlife refuges, natural area reserves, marine life conservation districts, wildlife sanctuaries, and private nature preserves. However, designations that facilitate or enable active management extend to forest reserves, state and county parks, watershed partnerships, and the state conservation district. All of these designations might include varying levels of tenure (permanence), and conservation intent, particularly intent to conserve and protect native biological diversity. We have chosen to depict tenure and intent of the varying kinds of protective designation in Hawaiʻi thusly: Tenure Permanent no intended end date NPS, USFWS, TNC, NARS Long 50-­‐200 years Conservation District, Forest Reserves Medium 10-­‐50 years Mature Watershed Partnership Short 1-­‐10 years Newly formed Watershed Partnership None 0 years Urban, Rural & Agricultural Districts Actual vs statutory tenure Because the instruments forming watershed partnerships typically allow for exit by any member with two weeks notice, the statutory tenure of a watershed partnership must be considered short. However, the stability of watershed partnerships to date has proven good, with the oldest of them approaching 25 years. We advocate tracking actual tenure, because it has been demonstrated that long-­‐
term management efforts result in long-­‐term biodiversity benefits. Intent Primary Maintaining native NPS, USFWS, TNC, NARS, biodiversity is the explicit Conservation District, Protective primary intent Subzone Multiple Use Native biological diversity is Watershed Partnerships, Forest one of several mandates, Reserves, Conservation District, intended to be compatible. General & Resource Subzones Incidental Native biodiversity is Conservation District, Limited incidentally included Subzone None No intent or mandate to State Urban, Rural & Agricultural protect native biodiversity Districts, most private properties Even a designation whose protection of biological diversity is incidental can provide the protective function of restriction of land use and development, but it often will not explicitly mandate protective management of the contained biodiversity. Mandate Although the legal basis for protective designation may not be the most important in assessing protective designation, it provides an important indicator of the strength of mandate for protection of native biodiversity. Is it voluntary? policy-­‐driven? statutory? The extent to which management is resistant to future change may be related to how strongly that mandate is established. We recognize four mandate conditions: • statutory (by law) • policy-­‐driven (by mission of managing entity) • discretionary (by intent of current leadership) • lacking (no mandate) Taken in combination the strongest protective designations have permanent tenure, are statutory, and carry an explicit intent focused primarily on biodiversity protection. Several of our protected areas in Hawaiʻi meet that criteria, including USFWS Wildlife Refuges, preserves of The Nature Conservancy, and State Natural Area Reserves. In contrast, the weakest are discretionary, incidental, and of short tenure. There are no major protected areas in Hawaiʻi that have such weak designation, though there are some areas of biodiversity importance that currently lack strong protection. In addition, it can be argued that some areas can stand to have tenure, intent, or mandate strengthened. The protective designation element of EC is the overlap between the underlying viable ecosystems and species populations, and those parcels of land or areas of the marine realm that enjoy a designation with sufficient tenure, intent, and mandate to enable the long-­‐term persistence (and growth) of our conservation targets. They will include all levels of designation, from none, to discretionary partnerships (such as the Watershed Partnerships on all islands), to land-­‐use districts (e.g., the State Conservation District), to State Forest Reserves, up to and including those areas that are permanent, statutory, and specifically dedicated to biodiversity protection. For many who assess conservation efforts, this combination of viable areas and protective designation is sufficient, but in HawaiʻI (and we argue everywhere conservation efforts are needed), a third element is essential: active management. The example given (Figure 3) depicts the intent attribute of protective designations on the islands of Maui and Kahoʻolawe. Figure 3: Islands of Maui and Kahoʻolawe, showing a) areas of land and sea bearing some form of protective designation, and b) intent of protective designations: dark green = biodiversity protection primary intent; light green = multiple use; yellow = incidental. III. Active Management: The third major element of EC is the management of threats to the viability of native ecosystems and species. Protective designation is viewed as an enabling factor encouraging and mandating active management of threats (or restoration of damaged or destroyed ecosystems). For terrestrial systems, such management may include such actions as: • fenced exclusion and removal of ungulates,
• predator control,
• prevention, control, or eradication of priority weeds,
• control of pests and pathogens
• fire prevention, management, and post-fire recovery
For marine systems management may include • Control of human overexploitation of marine species
• Removal of non-native invasive species
• Control of pollution and sedimentation
• Prevention of disturbance of marine mammals
The major goal of the EC Program is to offer accurate geospatial depiction of areas receiving active management, including areas that are fenced against ungulates (including fencelines and ungulate-­‐free areas), areas where priority weeds have been controlled/excluded, or where they are otherwise lacking, or where other special management is taking place that reduces threats and enhances ecosystem/species viability (e.g. no fishing zones and invasive marine algae control in marine protected areas). One of the major tools of the EC Program tracking management is the Manager’s Webmap, a web-­‐mediated GIS tool that is integrated with tracking/reporting systems of on-­‐the-­‐ground managers so that the status of management actions on the ground is depicted and described for all areas of conservation importance. It is not the purpose of the framework summary to describe the webmap in detail. The details of the webmap are described elsewhere. An example is provided below (Figure 4), showing active fencing and ungulate removal projects in the East Maui region. Figure 4: Ungulate control and fencing in East Maui: 2014 IV. Stakeholder Involvement and Support: The fourth element of EC is the extent to which protection and management of our unique ecosystems and species are supported and embraced as priority actions by human communities. Gauging stakeholder involvement and support involves building a shared awareness and appreciation of the pertinent biological resources, and offering partnered management and sustainable use of those resources, so that the efforts of conservation managers is viewed as a positive contribution to the human communities’ efforts to coexist in a positive relationship with our native ecosystems that allows both to thrive. This framework recognizes the particular importance of traditional Hawaiian knowledge and approaches, despite the multi-­‐cultural milieu of modern Hawaiʻi. This is because the host culture brings values, indigenous knowledge systems, and strong place-­‐based relationships that are either lacking or not as well developed by others. We acknowledge that measuring and depicting the extent and nature of stakeholder support is not easily achieved, and that EC goals to maximize positive stakeholder involvement and minimize human activities that damage long-­‐term ecosystem and species viability can be very difficult to attain. To that end the EC approach for human communities is to assess the extent of place-­‐
based knowledge and involvement, with an explicit goal of involving human communities in both management and monitoring of key measurements that are of common interest. For example, the following elements emerged in an initial polling of communities for those metrics important to their well-­‐being in two broad categories: biophysical and socio-­‐economic: Biophysical: • Water quality and availability
• Health of watersheds (e.g., % forest vs developed)
• Health of aquatic freshwater systems (e.g., streams)
• Health of nearshore ecosystems (e.g., coral reef)
• Health of native food species (e.g., native fisheries)
Socioeconomic: • Human health issues (e.g., incidence of disease)
• Presence/importance of traditional practice (e.g., loʻi agriculture)
• Community cohesion (e.g., presence/involvement of kūpuna)
Figure 5 depicts the locations of two communities on the island of Oʻahu where community engagement helped develop the above metrics. Lands managed by members of the HCA are also shown, indicating those agencies that share a stake with those communities. Figure 5: O‘ahu map with consulted communities (black stars) and HCA member stakeholder lands (colors). Effective Conservation Analyses By integrating assessments of the four factors -­‐-­‐ biodiversity health, protective designation, active management, and stakeholder support -­‐-­‐ across all of our conservation areas, land and sea, we are able to consistently and comprehensively track our conservation progress, identify needs, and focus our collective efforts more effectively. We do this by analyzing the extent to which those four factors are active in a geographic area. Conclusion: Use of the Effective Conservation Framework The adoption of Effective Conservation as a major program of the HCA is based on the utility of the EC effort to 1) document our collective conservation efforts over time, 2) assess progress in highest priority landscapes and seascapes, and 3) identify ongoing and future needs in a geospatially explicit manner. It places the HCA collectively in a position to greatly facilitate conservation efforts in Hawaiʻi, and serves as an internal communication tool for our own coordination of effort. It can also serve as a powerful external communication device to express to the public and decision-­‐makers, a measurable multiple-­‐scale context for conservation efforts. No matter how sophisticated our efforts on the ground become, as well as our abilities to track change in our monitoring and reporting, the EC Framework can always translate our work in terms of 1) the viable ecosystems of land and sea, 2) the protective designation that enables conservation action, 3) the active management needed to maintain our resources, and 4) the human community that both benefits from and holds a stake in our collective success.