Conservation Officers: A Force Multiplier for Homeland Security

Today's law enforcement officers—both conservation and police—find themselves adapting to an emerging and dynamic threat environment. Policies and practices aimed at the prevention of threats have focused primarily on federal, state, and local police agencies. At a time when terrorists, extremists, and activists have begun to widen their array of attack methods, collaboration across all sectors of law enforcement becomes essential. More specifically, an increased vulnerability to biological threats has not been met by steps to prevent or mitigate these threats. Conservation officers have a unique and integral role to enhance homeland security efforts given their day-to-day operations and interactions with the community, especially rural America. This article will discuss the role of conservation officers as it relates to homeland security—a significant conceptual component to research and practice that has largely been ignored by both academics and professionals. The integration of conservation officers into the proactive information sharing environment will be discussed to strengthen a culture of information sharing as it pertains to an “all-threats, all-hazards” philosophy and to enhance national security awareness. Moreover, this article will challenge the traditional range of threats associated with biological terrorism by providing an illustrative case study

Detecting and understanding non-compliance with conservation rules

AbstractThis paper establishes the context for the special issue, “Detecting and Understanding Violations of Conservation Rules”. Illicit or non-compliant human behaviors may occur in all ecosystems and range from subsistence illegal resource collection to poaching by organized criminal syndicates. Such acts have an enormous impact on social–ecological systems, but monitoring non-compliance is challenging, primarily because the topic is sensitive and victims are voiceless. The future of many conservation areas depends upon compliance with conservation rules. However, with a growing human population, consumptive societies, and rapid expansion of business opportunities fueled by new technology, there is little doubt that demand will remain steady or increase for many of our natural resources. We outline major conservation compliance issues and impacts, and review models and methods used to monitor and respond to the problem for both subsistence and commercial non-compliance

Gendered Risk Perceptions Associated with Human-Wildlife Conflict: Implications for Participatory Conservation

This research aims to foster discourse about the extent to which gender is important to consider within the context of participatory approaches for biological conservation. Our objectives are to: (1) gender-disaggregate data about stakeholders' risk perceptions associated with human-wildlife conflict (HWC) in a participatory conservation context, and (2) highlight insights from characterizing gendered similarities and differences in the way people think about HWC-related risks. Two communal conservancies in Caprivi, Namibia served as case study sites. We analyzed data from focus groups (n = 2) to create gendered concept maps about risks to wildlife and livelihoods and any associations of those risks with HWC, and semi-structured interviews (n = 76; men = 38, women = 38) to measure explicit risk attitudes associated with HWC. Concept maps indicated some divergent perceptions in how groups characterized risks to wildlife and livelihoods; however, not only were identified risks to wildlife (e.g., pollution, hunting) dissimilar in some instances, descriptions of risks varied as well. Study groups reported similar risk perceptions associated with HWC with the exception of worry associated with HWC effects on local livelihoods. Gendered differences in risk perceptions may signal different priorities or incentives to participate in efforts to resolve HWC-related risks. Thus, although shared goals and interests may seem to be an obvious reason for cooperative wildlife management, it is not always obvious that management goals are shared. Opportunity exists to move beyond thinking about gender as an explanatory variable for understanding how different groups think about participating in conservation activities

Estrategia para conservar las poblaciones de buitres del viejo mundo utilizando el enfoque de una salud

One Health brings the powerful interrelationship between human and wildlife health together with ecosystem health. The initial concept of One Health was formulated decades ago and focused on disease transfer from wildlife to human populations. More recently, the concept has been used to associate resilience to disease with the health of the ecosystem and resilience to environmental stressors. The need for a One Health approach is particularly evident in the plight of Old World vultures, which are facing a conservation crisis due to drastic reductions in populations across their entire range. Moreover, vulture conservation exemplifies many contemporary tenets of One Health; vultures are critical to a sustainable and resilient ecosystem, which in turn is essential for the socio-ecological health of human communities. In this review, we examine the complex factors contributing to the demise of Old World vulture populations, using the lens of One Health to conceptualize the primary drivers impacting the health and sustainability of these populations. The One Health concept provides the basis for the development of a framework that incorporates a multidimensional approach and includes human health, wildlife health, environmental and disease-related stressors, disease incidences, societal pressures, and environmental contaminants. Integrating societal needs with management aimed at maintaining healthy vulture populations is key for successfully using a One Health framework to optimize the health of human and wildlife populations and ensure ecosystem health.El enfoque ‘‘Una Salud’’ promueve una poderosa interrelacio´n entre la salud de los humanos y de la fauna salvaje asociados a la salud de los ecosistemas. El concepto inicial de Una Salud fue formulado de´cadas atra´s y se enfocaba en la transferencia de enfermedades de la fauna salvaje a las poblaciones humanas. Ma´s recientemente, el concepto ha sido usado para asociar la resiliencia a las enfermedades con la salud de los ecosistemas y la resiliencia a factores de estre´s ambiental. La necesidad de utilizar el enfoque de Una Salud es particularmente evidente ante la dif´ıcil situacio´n de los buitres del Viejo Mundo, los cuales se enfrentan a una situacio´n de crisis de conservacio´n debido a la reduccio´n dra´stica en sus poblaciones a lo largo de toda su a´rea de distribucio´n. Adema´s, la conservacio´n de los buitres ejemplifica mucho de los principios contempora´neos de Una Salud; los buitres son cr´ıticos para un ecosistema sostenible y resiliente, lo que a su vez es esencial para la salud socio-ecolo´gica de las comunidades humanas. En esta revisio´n, examinamos los factores complejos que contribuyen al descenso de las poblaciones de buitres del Viejo Mundo, usando el enfoque de Una Salud para conceptualizar los factores principales que impactan en la salud y la sostenibilidad de estas poblaciones. El concepto de Una Salud proporciona las bases para el desarrollo de un marco de referencia que incorpora un enfoque multidimensional, incluyendo la salud humana y de la vida silvestre, factores estresantes ambientales y de enfermedades, incidencia de enfermedades, presiones sociales y qu´ımicos ambientales. Integrar las necesidades de la sociedad con la gestio´n destinada a mantener poblaciones saludables de buitres es clave para usar exitosamente el marco de referencia de Una Salud y as´ı optimizar la salud de las poblaciones humanas y de la fauna salvaje asegurando la salud del ecosistema.The National Science Foundationhttps://bioone.org/journals/journal-of-raptor-researcham2022Zoology and Entomolog

Comparison of Intervention Programs Designed to Reduce Human-Bear Conflict: A Review of the Literature

Click on the PDF for an Executive Summary and the full report. Visit the HDRU website for a complete listing of HDRU publications at: http://hdru.dnr.cornell.edu

Attitude and behavior change associated with the New York NeighBEARhood Watch Program

Click on the PDF for an Executive Summary and the full report. Visit the HDRU website for a complete listing of HDRU publications at: http://hdru.dnr.cornell.edu

Learning by Doing: Deer Management in Urban and Suburban Communities

Click on the PDF for an Executive Summary and the full report. Visit the HDRU website for a complete listing of HDRU publications at: http://hdru.dnr.cornell.edu

Working Through Black Bear Management Issues

Click on the PDF for the full report. Visit the HDRU website for a complete listing of HDRU publications at: http://hdru.dnr.cornell.edu

Conservation Officers: A Force Multiplier for Homeland Security

Today's law enforcement officers—both conservation and police—find themselves adapting to an emerging and dynamic threat environment. Policies and practices aimed at the prevention of threats have focused primarily on federal, state, and local police agencies. At a time when terrorists, extremists, and activists have begun to widen their array of attack methods, collaboration across all sectors of law enforcement becomes essential. More specifically, an increased vulnerability to biological threats has not been met by steps to prevent or mitigate these threats. Conservation officers have a unique and integral role to enhance homeland security efforts given their day-to-day operations and interactions with the community, especially rural America. This article will discuss the role of conservation officers as it relates to homeland security—a significant conceptual component to research and practice that has largely been ignored by both academics and professionals. The integration of conservation officers into the proactive information sharing environment will be discussed to strengthen a culture of information sharing as it pertains to an “all-threats, all-hazards” philosophy and to enhance national security awareness. Moreover, this article will challenge the traditional range of threats associated with biological terrorism by providing an illustrative case study

Local Perspectives on Environmental Insecurity and Its Influence on Illegal Biodiversity Exploitation

Environmental insecurity is a source and outcome of biodiversity declines and social conflict. One challenge to scaling insecurity reduction policies is that empirical evidence about local attitudes is overwhelmingly missing. We set three objectives: determine how local people rank risk associated with different sources of environmental insecurity; assess perceptions of environmental insecurity, biodiversity exploitation, myths of nature and risk management preferences; and explore relationships between perceptions and biodiversity exploitation. We conducted interviews (N = 88) with residents of Madagascar’s Torotorofotsy Protected Area, 2014. Risk perceptions had a moderate effect on perceptions of environmental insecurity. We found no effects of environmental insecurity on biodiversity exploitation. Results offer one if not the first exploration of local perceptions of illegal biodiversity exploitation and environmental security. Local people’s perception of risk seriousness associated with illegal biodiversity exploitation such as lemur hunting (low overall) may not reflect perceptions of policy-makers (considered to be high). Discord is a key entry point for attention