TY - JOUR

T1 - Introducing Elinor for monitoring the governance and management of area-based conservation

AU - Mahajan, Shauna L.

AU - Obiene, Samson

AU - Ojwang, Lenice

AU - Olwero, Nasser

AU - Valdivia, Abel

AU - Wosu, Adaoma

AU - Adrid, Emily

AU - Andradi-Brown, Dominic A.

AU - Andriamalala, Gildas

AU - Ban, Natalie C.

AU - Bennett, Nathan J.

AU - Blythe, Jessica

AU - Cheng, Samantha H.

AU - Darling, Emily

AU - De Nardo, Matheus

AU - Drury O'Neill, Elizabeth

AU - Epstein, Graham

AU - Fidler, Robert Y.

AU - Fisher, Kim

AU - Geldmann, Jonas

AU - Gill, David A.

AU - Kroner, Rachel Golden

AU - Gurney, Georgina

AU - Jagadish, Arundhati

AU - Jonas, Harry D.

AU - Lazuardi, Muhammad Erdi

AU - Petersen, Samantha

AU - Ranarivelo, Valencia V.

AU - Rasoloformanana, Lilia

AU - Rasolozaka, Tojo M.

AU - Read, Daniel J.

AU - Mwaiteleke, Elia Sabula

AU - Ahmadia, Gabby

N1 - Publisher Copyright: © 2023 World Wildlife Fund, Inc. Conservation Biology published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Society for Conservation Biology.

PY - 2024

Y1 - 2024

N2 - Monitoring the governance and management effectiveness of area-based conservation has long been recognized as an important foundation for achieving national and global biodiversity goals and enabling adaptive management. However, there are still many barriers that prevent conservation actors, including those affected by governance and management systems from implementing conservation activities and programs and from gathering and using data on governance and management to inform decision-making across spatial scales and through time. We explored current and past efforts to assess governance and management effectiveness and barriers actors face in using the resulting data and insights to inform conservation decision-making. To help overcome these barriers, we developed Elinor, a free and open-source monitoring tool that builds on the work of Nobel Prize winner Elinor Ostrom to facilitate the gathering, storing, sharing, analyzing, and use of data on environmental governance and management across spatial scales and for areas under different governance and management types. We consider the process of codesigning and piloting Elinor with conservation scientists and practitioners and the main components of the assessment and online data system. We also consider how Elinor complements existing approaches by addressing governance and management in a single assessment at a high level for different types of area-based conservation, providing flexible options for data collection, and integrating a data system with an assessment that can support data use and sharing across different spatial scales, including global monitoring of the Global Biodiversity Framework. Although challenges will continue, the process of developing Elinor and the tool itself offer tangible solutions to barriers that prevent the systematic collection and use of governance and management data. With broader uptake, Elinor can play a valuable role in enabling more effective, inclusive, and durable area-based conservation.

AB - Monitoring the governance and management effectiveness of area-based conservation has long been recognized as an important foundation for achieving national and global biodiversity goals and enabling adaptive management. However, there are still many barriers that prevent conservation actors, including those affected by governance and management systems from implementing conservation activities and programs and from gathering and using data on governance and management to inform decision-making across spatial scales and through time. We explored current and past efforts to assess governance and management effectiveness and barriers actors face in using the resulting data and insights to inform conservation decision-making. To help overcome these barriers, we developed Elinor, a free and open-source monitoring tool that builds on the work of Nobel Prize winner Elinor Ostrom to facilitate the gathering, storing, sharing, analyzing, and use of data on environmental governance and management across spatial scales and for areas under different governance and management types. We consider the process of codesigning and piloting Elinor with conservation scientists and practitioners and the main components of the assessment and online data system. We also consider how Elinor complements existing approaches by addressing governance and management in a single assessment at a high level for different types of area-based conservation, providing flexible options for data collection, and integrating a data system with an assessment that can support data use and sharing across different spatial scales, including global monitoring of the Global Biodiversity Framework. Although challenges will continue, the process of developing Elinor and the tool itself offer tangible solutions to barriers that prevent the systematic collection and use of governance and management data. With broader uptake, Elinor can play a valuable role in enabling more effective, inclusive, and durable area-based conservation.

KW - area-based conservation

KW - base de datos

KW - biodiversidad

KW - biodiversity

KW - conservación basada en zonas

KW - database

KW - decision-making

KW - efectividad de la gestión

KW - equitable governance

KW - gobernanza

KW - gobernanza equitativa

KW - governance

KW - management effectiveness

KW - monitoreo

KW - monitoring

KW - toma de decisiones

KW - 公平治理

KW - 决策

KW - 基于区域的保护

KW - 数据库

KW - 治理

KW - 生物多样性

KW - 监测

KW - 管理有效性

U2 - 10.1111/cobi.14213

DO - 10.1111/cobi.14213

M3 - Journal article

C2 - 37904666

AN - SCOPUS:85184264976

VL - 38

JO - Conservation Biology

JF - Conservation Biology

SN - 0888-8892

IS - 2

M1 - e14213

ER -