Private conservation encouraged by incentives

A great contribution of private conservation will be possible only when it is encouraged through effective incentives. For this reason, in this section some incentives, though elaborated mainly for the specific circumstances/characteristics of the study zone, are proposed and discussed. Nevertheless, the identification of the best incentives requires more research and pilot experiments.

5.3.1.1. Current viable incentives

Technical interdisciplinary support

The close collaboration with landowners during the course of this study allowed the direct discussion of options and visions. It has been observed that proprietors in one or the other way admit the importance of conservation in their holdings, but still most of them prefer to use their land for production.

In this context, the elaboration of a land use plan free of charge, providing an interdisciplinary team of technicians that benefited the landowners, namely technical support in the land use planning process, was an effective instrument to inform proprietors about the profitable and sustainable use of the holding’s resources. In some cases, this dialogue could change the destructive attitude. Therefore, this strategy should be further developed and spread in order to support the creation of more protected areas on private land, which should be appropriately combined with other sustainable alternatives like forestry, agroforestry and silvo-pastoral production systems.

NGOs and the governmental institutions would provide the mentioned technical support.

Experiences in private conservation in countries like Costa Rica, Mexico and Paraguay coincidently show that technical and legal support are interesting incentives for proprietors in rural areas. Mainly NGOs have provided this type of incentive, which is cheap and represents a way that multiplies the possible uses of the resources, for example organic production and eco-tourism.

Since 2002, the Bolivian NGOs FAN-Bolivia and FCBC have been carrying out pilot projects that offer land-planning support as main incentive for private conservation with effective results.

Recognition and award of private conservation initiatives

Conservation on private land, informal or based on legal norms, is expensive and difficult to carry out. Nevertheless, most of the proprietors who have accepted to participate in biodiversity conservation are not yet recognized for their efforts not only by the state but also not by the rest of the society, even though their works benefit the general environmental conditions for everyone.

According to the results of the NGO’s work in Latin America and pilot experiments of private conservation in Bolivia (Choquehuanca 2003; Choquehuanca & Eguino 2003) social recognition is an important incentive for conservation. In this study, conservationists owning land have been encouraged by the researchers` recognition of their contribution to biodiversity. In particular, the interchange of local versus scientific knowledge has enhanced the landowners’ valuation of conservation.

Hence, projects and programs encouraging proprietors in different ways will enhance the adoption of conservation issues, for instance the rewarding of proprietors who show remarkable work and the diffusion of the information about this work. Thus, these proprietors will gain respect for their engagement in private land conservation and other proprietors will try to follow up and also take part in the protection of biodiversity.

Furthermore, positive effects for conservation may be expected by rewarding eco-efficient production, such as coffee production in agroforestry systems or by rewarding the ecological production of meat or sustainable logging.

5.3.1.2. Incentives to be developed

Private conservation will not be able to make a significant contribution as long as effective incentives are not developed, but this task involves more specific studies and pilot projects. In this section, incentives that could be developed in the future are enumerated as ideas for future studies.

Payment for environmental services

Recently, payments for environmental services have been frequently mentioned as tools for conservation financing. Private land conservation researchers and institutions have discussed this economic way to get benefits for conservationists owing land. However, with the exception of Costa Rica, no other country of Latin America has achieved a similar program to directly compensate the conservation of nature. In the case of Bolivia, monetary compensations for conservation are still from being carried out considering the country’s low incomes and, as a consequence, the low suitable funds for biodiversity conservation.

Payment of environmental services on local or national level would be possible if the users recognised the importance of areas providing these services (Ibisch & Choquehuanca 2004), for instance the hydro-regulatory function of the study area. Then diffusion and education, environmental economic valuation, and political lobbying are some measures to undertake as first steps in a program for environmental compensation. The ideal achievement would be to include the costs in the national accounts and budgets.

Since the 1990s, international protocols, such as the Kyoto protocol, have opened the discussion of compensations for fixation of carbon in forest areas, aiming to reduce global warming, but disagreements are avoiding the development of this mechanism of compensation. Under the current conditions of the Kyoto protocol only forestation is supported. Proprietors of agricultural land could also benefit but currently only the early stages of this mechanism are developed and there are no programs for implementation yet.

Incentives for forest reserves and forest production on private holdings

In theory, economic direct compensation for conservation would be the best incentive, but in praxis the few undertaken experiences in Costa Rica have shown that this incentive is not perfect and sustainable (see Chapter 2.3). For this reason, economic incentives that improve the production capacity of holdings seem to be more realistic and feasible than short term direct compensations.

With regard to the study zone, the results of the ecoregional analysis (chapter 5.1.) and other land-use planning studies (PLUS, PCBC) imply that the region has a regular to high potential for forestry, therefore incentives that enforce forestry activities may significantly contribute to conservation and thus maintain connectivity. Research on the impacts of logging on Bolivian Forests has not revealed many primary negative impacts on biodiversity. The most important impact due to logging are the secondary impacts. Although the logging causes changes in the

forest, this remains and recuperates, in some cases, very rapidly if the planning and implementation of the logging is done well” (Fredericksen 2004). In this way, the development of the following incentives is recommended:

• Tax incentives for sustainable logging in private holdings

• Support of forest management practices to enhance a rapid regeneration of wood in private reserves

Support of private initiatives of eco-tourism

Eco-tourism can also be an activity that promotes conservation on private land. There are some proprietors who certainly want to explore the possible benefits of this activity, but they need support for the construction of infrastructure and the improvement of their human resources (e.g. guides). However, the current demand for tourist services is still very low so it is recommended, as a first step, to limit the support to only a few landowners.