Neal Hockley

Bangor University · College of Environmental Sciences and Engineering

In the eastern rainforests of Madagascar, rainfed swidden rice cultivation remains prevalent despite efforts to encourage uptake of irrigated systems to reduce deforestation. We used agricultural surveys with a stratified sample of 171 households to investigate constraints on and productivity of irrigated and rainfed rice perceived by farmers, and...

La restauration des paysages forestiers (RPF) vise à restaurer la fonctionnalité du paysage au profit des populations locales, du climat et de la biodiversité. Elle requiert une gouvernance foncière efficace. Cette étude analyse les inconsistances et limites des stratégies nationales et textes juridiques par rapport à l’efficacité de la RPF et avan...

Rapport technique préliminaire du projet « Les Nouvelles Aires Protégées (NAPs) de Madagascar face à la réduction de la pauvreté : bonnes pratiques et nouvelles approches » http://forest4climateandpeople.bangor.ac.uk/poverty-alleviation.php.fr Draft technical report of the project "Reconciling Madagascar’s New Protected Areas with poverty alleviat...

Biodiversity is valuable to society, including through its contribution to cultural benefits: “the non-material benefits people obtain from biodiversity and ecosystem services through spiritual enrichment, cognitive development, reflection, recreation, and aesthetic experiences”. Biodiversity encompasses numerous measures, but the distinct values o...

Decentralised forest management approaches are ostensibly designed to increase community involvement in forest management, yet have had mixed success in practice. We present a comparative study across multiple countries in Eastern Africa of how far decentralised forest policies are designed to achieve devolution. We adopt the decentralisation frame...

Before the 1980s, centralized forest policies in many African countries excluded local communities, while forest resources were frequently degraded. In response, Participatory Forest Management (PFM) was introduced to devolve management and improve livelihoods, forest condition and governance. Building on existing analyses that highlight the limite...

The Government of Madagascar is trying to reduce deforestation and conserve biodiversity through creating new protected areas in the eastern rainforests. While this has many benefits, forest use restriction may bring costs to farmers at the forest frontier. We explored this through a series of surveys in five sites around the Corridor Ankeniheny Za...

Background While the importance of conserving ecosystems for sustainable development is widely recognized, it is increasingly evident that despite delivering global benefits, conservation often comes at local cost. Protected areas funded by multilateral lenders have explicit commitments to ensure that those negatively affected are adequately compen...

Fig. S4. Population distribution within a 2 km buffer of CAZ. Established protected areas managed by Madagascar National Parks (with 2 Km buffer around them) have been excluded as different compensation right exist there. The population model is based on Landscan 2007 data distributed with the EcoEngine algorithm in WaterWorld.

Fig. S1. How households gain access to land in the study sites. Y-axis shows the overall percentage of plots in each site being accessed through one of the five ways listed–total adding up to 100% for each site. Error bars show 95% confidence intervals.

Fig. S3. Pictures showing the context of the field work presented in this paper. a), b) The biodiversity of the CAZ is world-renowned. c), d) 10s of 1000s of people live around the CAZ new protected area, traditionally most people depend economically on clearing land for agriculture in a swidden system known locally as ‘tavy.’ e) The CAZ protected...

Table S1. Attributes and levels of the choice experiment (reference levels in bold).

Survey instruments for phase three of field work. Contingent valuation of the compensation recieved by housholds (in English and Malagasy).

Fig. S2. The value of the compensation projects as a percentage of household opportunity cost. Data is for 62 recipients of compensation (all from site 1), 2 years after compensation was received. The value of compensation is estimated from our contingent valuation while the opportunity cost of conservation is estimated from the choice experiment.

Survey instruments for phase one of field work. (household survey and choice experiment in English and Malagasy).

Fig. S5. Examining goodness of fit of the modelled population from existing sources with our population data collected from the study areas. Our field data shows the primary census data collected in each fokontany during 2014/2015 (population data from p4ges field sites) plotted against the population estimates for those sites from LandScan 2007 (L...

Table S2. The coefficients from the choice experiment. Lower and upper bounds are 95% confidence intervals.

Survey instruments for phase two of field work. (Agricultural survey in English and Malagasy).

Fig. S6. Example choice card of the Discrete Choice Experiment used to estimate opportunity costs.

Table S3. The annualised opportunity costs of conservation per household (USD).

Using a diverse assemblage of suitable species for reforestation is necessary to enhance biodiversity and ensure resilient forest ecosystems. However, selection of diverse native species for reforestation is difficult, requiring consideration of the preferences of different stakeholders. In this study we identify species to be included in reforesta...

Where rights over natural resources are contested, the effectiveness of conservation may be undermined and it can be difficult to estimate the welfare impacts of conservation restrictions on local people. In particular, researchers face the dilemma of estimating respondents’ Willingness To Pay (WTP) for rights to resources, or their Willingness To...

Aim of study: Incentivising landowners to supply ecosystem services remains challenging, especially when this requires long-term investments such as reforestation. We investigated how landowners perceive, and would respond to, distinct types of incentives for planting diverse native trees on private lands in Lebanon. Our aim was to understand lando...

Forest co-management programmes aim to conserve forest resources. However, there is little evidence of its effectiveness. We assess the impact of co-management approaches on forest conditions in Zomba-Malosa and Ntchisi forest reserves in Malawi using a multiple-site, plot-based, control-intervention design. We used tree density and species richnes...

Protected areas may impose local welfare costs through the enforcement of use restrictions. Predicting their welfare impacts before their establishment could help with the design of compensation schemes. Discrete choice experiments (DCEs) are increasingly used for ex ante evaluations but their validity is largely untested in low-income settings. Us...

Criteria for assessing success or failure of forest co-management programmes may vary among different participating actors. Local people are important actors in co-management, thus understanding their perceived criteria is important in evaluating forest co-management programmes. We interviewed 134 ordinary community members and 21 committee members...

Valuation that focuses only on individual values evades the substantial collective and intersubjective meanings, significance and value from ecosystems. Shared, plural and cultural values of ecosystems constitute a diffuse and interdisciplinary field of research, covering an area that links questions around value ontology, elicitation and aggregati...

While discrete choice experiments (DCEs) are increasingly used in the field of environmental valuation, they remain controversial because of their hypothetical nature and the contested reliability and validity of their results. We systematically reviewed evidence on the validity and reliability of environmental DCEs from the past thirteen years (Ja...

There is extensive debate about the potential impact of the climate mechanism REDD+ on the welfare of forest-dwelling people. To provide emission reductions, REDD+ must slow the rate of deforestation and forest degradation: such a change will tend to result in local opportunity cost to farmers at the forest frontier. Social safeguard processes to m...

Comanagement programmes are gaining popularity among governments as one way of improving rural livelihoods. However, evidence of their effects on the livelihoods and welfare remains unclear. We used the sustainable livelihoods framework and stated preference techniques to assess the livelihoods and welfare impacts of forest comanagement on 213 hous...

Community-based approaches to natural resource management, including forest co-management, form part of a wider trend of decentralization of governance. In terms of process change and the level of power and responsibility transferred, decentralization takes many forms including deconcentration, delegation and devolution. It is expected that forest...

Social valuation of ecosystem services and public policy alternatives is one of the greatest challenges facing ecological economists today. Frameworks for valuing nature increasingly include shared/social values as a distinct category of values. However, the nature of shared/social values, as well as their relationship to other values, has not yet...

Managing ecosystems for multiple benefits and stakeholders is a formidable challenge requiring diverse knowledge to be discovered, transmitted, and aggregated. Cost–benefit analysis (CBA) is advocated as a theoretically grounded decision-support tool, but in practice it frequently appears to exert little influence. To understand this puzzle, I...

Since the 1980s Madagascar has experienced increasing international attention promoting conservation and development, attracted by its biodiversity hotspot status. The island has consequently been a testing ground for new approaches to environmental governance including integrated conservation and development projects, community-based natural resou...

There are increasing concerns that monetary valuation of ecosystem services using survey-based methods does not fully capture the value that people attach to the natural environment. For example, people have values in relation to nature that are not instrumental, but relate to rights, duties and virtues, which are difficult to translate into prefer...

Background Establishing Protected Areas (PAs) is among the most common conservation interventions. Protecting areas from the threats posed by human activity will by definition inhibit some human actions. However, adverse impacts could be balanced by maintaining ecosystem services or introducing new livelihood options. Consequently there is an ongoi...

Natural capital and ecosystem service concepts are embodied in the ecosystems approach to sustainable development, which is a framework being consistently adopted by decision making bodies ranging from national governments to the United Nations. In the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment soils are given the vital role of a supporting service, but many...

Soil is part of the Earth's life support system, but how should we convey the value of this and of soil as a resource? Consideration of the ecosystem services and natural capital of soils offers a framework going beyond performance indicators of soil health and quality, and recognizes the broad value that soil contributes to human wellbeing. This a...

Soil is essential to agriculture and a resource that cannot be replaced easily. Nevertheless, its importance to food production and the threats to its sustainability are often overlooked. This book, the 35th volume of Issues in Environmental Science and Technology, examines the current status of soils across the globe and their potential for food p...

In their Report “Historical warnings of future food insecurity with unprecedented seasonal heat” (9 January, p. [240][1]), D. S. Battisti and R. L. Naylor argue that because agricultural yields are severely reduced in anomalously hot years, a general rise in average growing season temperature

Informal institutions governing the use of wild species are present in many societies. A system of prohibitions known as fady is central to Malagasy culture. We examined whether fady that relate to the use of natural resources in the eastern rainforests of Madagascar play an important conservation role. Prohibitions ranged from strict taboos in whi...

Summary 1. Many aspects of human behaviour impact on ecological systems. Ecologists therefore need information on changes in these behaviours and are increasingly using methods more familiar to social scientists. 2. Understanding patterns of wildlife harvesting is important for assessing the sustainability of harvests. Interviews are commonly used...

Aquaculture of native species appeals to conservation projects in developing countries. It promises to raise local incomes while taking pressure off native stocks, without the risks associated with introducing exotic species into an area of conservation concern. We consider the case of native freshwater crayfish in Madagascar, a proposed target for...

1. Freshwater crayfish of the genus Astacoides are endemic to the highlands of eastern Madagascar. Very little is known about their ecology and how this affects their vulnerability to threats. Working in the Fianarantsoa forest corridor, we used a combination of ecological research (>29 000 crayfish caught and released) and interviews (>130 intervi...

Where enforcement capacity for externally defined rules is weak, informal institutions which regulate access to wild species are of great interest to conservationists. A system of prohibitions known as fady is central to Malagasy culture. We look at the fady that affect natural resource use in the eastern rainforests of Madagascar, discuss whether...

We reviewed existing studies and data to conduct a social cost-benefit analysis for a new protected area in south-eastern Madagascar. T he global net present value of conserving the Ranomafana-Andringitra-Pic d'Ivohibe corridor is large and positive, with a mid range estimate of over US$ 330 million, if benefits are not weighted according to the in...

Madagascar's endemic freshwater crayfish (Parastacidae: Astacoides) are harvested by local people for both subsistence use and small-scale trade. There has been concern that populations, and even species, are threatened by overexploitation but little is known about the harvest or its economic importance. We studied crayfish exploitation in eastern...

Both conservationists and harvesters may be willing to contribute to participatory monitoring of exploited species. However, this can be costly and stakeholders need to choose whether monitoring programs or other alternatives, such as a moratorium or unmonitored exploitation, meet their objectives most efficiently. We discuss when, and how much, st...

There is growing interest among conservation decision makers in promoting harvesting of forest products as an incentive for communities to retain forest cover. Assessments of the sustainability of existing harvests are essential for implementing such policies. Madagascar's endemic freshwater crayfish, Astacoides spp., are harvested throughout their...

Declines in marine harvests, wildlife, and habitats have prompted calls at both the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development and the 2003 World Parks Congress for the establishment of a global system of marine protected areas (MPAs). MPAs that restrict fishing and other human activities conserve habitats and populations and, by exporting biomas...

Driver ants ( Dorylus spp.) show a high degree of worker polymorphism. Previous reports suggest that large Dorylus workers are specialised for defensive tasks. In this study, we first quantitatively tested whether there is a size-correlated division of defensive labour among workers. Second, we determined whether the spatial distribution of workers...