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Powerpoint presentation on priorities emerging from the IUCN World Parks Congress 2014

To introduce this collection of studies, a logical first question to ask is why produce a “lessons learned” publication? The initial impetus for this initiative was an observation by an external evaluation of CARPE that there was relatively little sharing of information within the programme between numerous actors and sites concerning the conservation strategies undertaken and the results achieved (Weidemann Consortium, 2006).1 The evaluation concluded that this lack of information exchange was a threat to the success of CARPE as a large-scale regional programme, a view that was confirmed by programme partners during the CARPE Phase IIB Inception workshop that was held in Yaoundé in February 2007.

The eastern chimpanzee (Pan troglodytes schweinfurthii) is classified as ‘Endangered’ and of global conservation concern. Numbers are declining because of hunting for bush meat, killing of animals to capture infants for the pet trade, disease, loss of habitat to agriculture and mining, and fragmentation of habitat leading to the isolation of small populations which are likely to become genetically unviable in the long term. This species occurs at a low density wherever it occurs (less than 1/km² of forest on average across much of their range) and has a relatively slow reproductive rate, with one infant born every 4–5 years. Consequently, they need large areas of habitat to maintain viable populations, and take a long time to recover from any reduction in popula-tion from disease or hunting.

As environmental problems continue to increase at an ever more rapid rate, exacerbated by the major threat of global climate change, the need for widespread remedial action is becoming ever more pressing. Scientific consensus on both the root causes of these problems and the measures required to tackle them is growing, while mass media and public interest has reached fever pitch. Of course, while this has put pressure on decisionmakers to take positive action, the realisation of the gravity and extent of the environmental problems has encouraged all those concerned about the state of our world to search for partners around it: one such significant partnership to e­merge in recent years is between those concerned with the conservation of nature –and of its biodiversity– and the custodians of sacred sites, representing both indigenous beliefs and mainstream faiths.

This guidebook offers managers and other conservation practitioners1 a process and methods to evaluate the effectiveness of marine protected areas (MPAs) for the purposes of adaptive management. The evaluation is based on indicators that measure the effectiveness of management actions in attaining goals and objectives that are specific to MPAs, the marine environment and coastal communities. It presents a flexible approach that can be used in many types of MPAs, such as multiple-use areas or no-take zones, where each may have different goals and objectives. It offers a variety of indicators that reflect a diversity of MPA goals and objectives. These can be selected to best match your MPA based on the needs and resources of your site.