2. LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1. The paradigm of private land conservation and its contribution to the conservation
Since the creation of the first National Park in the USA in the year 1872, the establishment of protected areas has been the main state strategy for biodiversity conservation. In 2003 the World Commission on Protected Areas reported that globally protected areas covered up to 18,8 million of km² (12.65% of the Earth’s land surface) and the majority of protected areas had been established after the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 (Chape et al. 2003).
Furthermore, they state that a greater increase will not be possible in the future because of the general socio-economic conditions. For this reason alternative mechanisms and instruments have to be developed for protection of biodiversity outside of national protected areas. The conservation on private land or private land conservation could be one of the real alternatives (Choquehuanca 2003 and 2004).
Conservation on private land should be defined as a set of initiatives and actions to preserve natural values located on private ownerships. This kind of conservation is not, contrary to popular opinion, a twentieth century invention (Levitt 2001). A lot of private efforts, which have not yet been studied sufficiently, have already contributed substantially in different ways to the conservation of the world’s biodiversity and they have an unexplored potential to complement and strengthen the national systems of protected areas (ELI et al. 2003).
In the last decade, several institutions have been working to promote conservation on private land as an alternative to complement national conservation efforts. In the first steps, the private efforts have focused on land purchase and land stewardships as central tools for conservation (LTA online 2000, Czech 2002). These ways have sometimes been successful in a certain context, however, the conservation on private land is not only the simple isolation of certain wild areas, especially in places with social problems and conflicts, as it is the case in Bolivia. In recent years, voluntary deals with private landowners, achieved using incentives, have been the most successful instruments.
The contribution of private land conservation to biodiversity conservation is not yet well-known because little effort has been given to systematise the outcomes in this work (Merenlender et al. 2004). Some examples of private land conservation and their contribution
to national conservation are discussed in the following paragraphs comparing developed and developing countries.
The USA is one of the countries where the conservation on private land is well-developed.
Some of the first private initiatives to protect nature occurred in the 18th century (Levitt 2001). More organized and systematised works have been made since the 1960s. Private conservation groups, called “Land Trusts”, promoted private land conservation through land purchases, land stewardships and conservation easements. The Land Trust organizations currently protect 6.2 million acres (LTA online 2002). However, according to Merenlender et al. (2004), it is difficult to determine exactly the whole contribution of Land Trusts’ works to the conservation in the USA because “easily available information on protected resources it too aggregated to determine what is actually being conserved, and more detailed data is widely scattered and hence difficult to synthesize”. It shows problems of coordination and interchange of information among these conservation institutions. A study carried out on private lands in USA reports that these lands harbor a great amount of biodiversity, including 95% of the federally listed species, which shows the importance of conducting conservation researches and measures on these areas (Hilty & Merenlender 2003).
Another example of conservation on private lands has been developed in Australia, where 14 million hectares are protected in more than 600 private reserves (Fundación Bertoni 2000, Latrina et al. 2000, Australian Bush Heritage online 2004). The private land conservation has a major significance for example to manage the Koala, which is one of the Australian key species (Lunney et. al. 2000).
Both the USA and Australia have a clear land property right situation and a clear legal framework which allow the development of private conservationists’ proposals. This is a mayor difference to experiences with conservation in developing countries like in Latin America.
In Latin America countries, the private conservation movement has been promoted by international NGOs like The Nature Conservancy (TNC) and Conservation International (CI).
These institutions have imported their methods and conservation visions but they have also developed new manners in associating with local partners.
In Paraguay at the beginning of the 1980s, only 3% of the total surface was protected and 95% of the national territory belonged to private landowners. For this reason TNC and Fundación Bertoni (a local NGO) in alliance with the Paraguay Government have promoted the establishment of private reserves in order to save threatened natural areas. By the end of
2000, private reserves covered already 134,008 ha (0.3 % of the country), but the general objective of these measures was to cover about 10% of the whole territory. A report on 10 years of the Bertoni Foundation’s work mentioned that the main problems for private land conservation are: (a) existence of an inadequate law and the obstacles to applying it, (b) concern about the invasion of land considered without use, (c) unplanned expropriations of private land in order to support farmers without land, (d) the lack of incomes to manage private reserves, (e) illegal hunting and extractions of natural values, (f) absence of environmental education, and (g) the lack of technical support to the landowners. In spite of those problems, one of the most important results of these projects was the introduction of private land conservation into the national System of protected areas (Fundación Bertoni 2000)
Among the countries of Latin America Costa Rica is first in the development of measures to protect the environment and biodiversity. Their solid system of protected areas, the innovative mechanisms to pay for environmental services of forests (PES) and the modern infrastructure for eco-tourism are well-known. In this country, conservation on private land has been developed successfully by non-governmental institutions. In 1992 CEDARENA, a Costa Rica NGO, explored, for the first time ever in Latin America, the possibility to protect lands in perpetuity using conservation easements. That same year the first ecological easement was created in Costa Rica (CEDARENA online 2004). Since then this organization has promoted the diffusion of conservation easements and it has had good outcomes, but the area protected on these initiatives is small (less than 0.1% of the country’s territory, see table 4).
Nevertheless their results are qualitatively significant because the conservation easements assure a long-term protection of some endangered areas.
Other alternatives to protect nature on private land in Costa Rica have managed to cover more surfaces, especially the creation of forest reserves and forest management areas that were promoted by the payment for PES. The inversion of 80 millions dollars allowed the protection of 300,000 ha of forest (Rosa et. al. 2003).
Another examples show the first steps of the work with peasants and indigenous people. In Colombia, for instance, the “RECSA” has promoted the conservation of natural landscapes and forest stressing social participation. Their results are currently not very extent in surface (40,000 ha, < 1 % of Columbian area) but it promoted a social vision of nature (RESNATUR online 2004). In the same way, PRONATURA AC is working with indigenous people searching a common vision for the preservation of natural resources (PRONATURA A.C.
online 2004).
As can be seen from the mentioned experiences, private land conservation started only recently in Latin America and although to date its contribution is small in terms of surface, its potential to support conventional conservation is very high.