The U.S. General Accountability Office (USGAO) released a brief but useful report on the activities that U.S. agencies (including the Agency for International Development, USFWS, and Justice Department) have conducted to combat wildlife trafficking (they refer to with acronym CWT). They describe the involvement of foreign terrorist organizations in the trafficking including al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb, al-Shabaab, and Boko Haram, al-shabaab, and the Lord’s Resistance Army. Their major critique of the efforts is that it is impossible to assess success because performance targets were not made for the programs. But they admit the failure to evaluate these programs can be attributed to few causes such as “results cannot be attributed solely to U.S. government actions and are dependent on continued combined global effort; results often require years to document accurately; many potential indicators are metrics with limited or uneven availability of data from the key developing countries; and reporting against metrics could downplay the contributions of other stakeholders, divert resources, and either risk oversimplification or confuse audiences with complicated explanations of the limitations of quantitative targets (p38).” The report is available at http://www.gao.gov/assets/680/679968.pdf
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Dave Foreman. (2012). Take Back Conservation. Durango, Co: Raven’s Eye Press. This work by the outspoken Foreman states the case for valuing wildlife for its own sake—not for the value that it can be employed to assist humans in their endeavors (this latter emphasis is what Foreman refers to as “resourcism.”) Foreman argues that it is dangerous to emphasize the “dollar worth of wild havens”—i.e., the instrumental value of wildlife. He cites survey data to show that a large percentage of people even so-called conservative western states support the value of wildlife for non-consumption purposes. He draws a sharp distinction between conservationists who focus on wildlife and “environmentalists” who focus on human interests even though he acknowledges they can, on occasion, cooperate. He talks a bit about the possible coalitions among wildlife conservationists, environmentalists, hunters and conservatives—pointing out that some important conservatives have sometimes supported conservation. However, Foreman’s work does not explain the political dynamics of wildlife such as how energy extraction and rancher interests dominate state (and often national) wildlife politics. (Note: A major purpose of my book, Wildlife Politics, is to study the dynamics that do
A recent paper; The Persistence of Subsistence: Wild Food Harvests in Rural Alaska, 1983-2013 by James S. Magdanz et al. studies subsistence hunting and fishing in Alaska. One key finding is the importance of roads. They state that “Propensity score matching finds that roads have significant, strong, and negative effects on subsistence harvests, but no significant effects on incomes.” Roads make it easier for non-native urban populations to gain from subsistence hunting and fishing. The study is available at https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2779464
An article by Tim Vanderpool in the Nov. 28, 2016 issue of High Country News discusses the trafficking of snakes such as twin-spotted rattlesnakes in Arizona. Although Arizona has taken steps to detect, arrest, and punish traffickers (the snakes are sold online), the article outlines the many difficulties. It takes extensive time and effort to catch a poacher. Even when they are caught, the trafficking is treated as a misdemeanor (unless it involves an endangered species) and thus only a relatively small fine (no jail time) is levied that traffickers treat as a “cost of doing business.” Moreover, if the poacher can move the snake to states that do not care as much as Arizona, they are unlikely to be punished at all, thus pointing to the need for national action. The article is available at http://www.hcn.org/external_files/digitaledition/48-20.pdf
A paper by Patricia Silva explores the impact of Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) on fishing villages in Tanzania. She finds that MPAs that promote alternative income generating activities (AIGA) influence households in Tanzania to use less destructive fishing methods. Several huge MPAs have been established in recent years and this is an example of research that is needed to determine how effective these MPAs are. The paper is a World Bank Group. World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3831, February 2006. It is available at http://elibrary.worldbank.org/doi/abs/10.1596/1813-9450-3831
P. J. Sulllivan et al. published a committee report in Fisheries journal in 2006 (31, #9, p. 460-464) titled “Defining and Implementing Best Available Science for Fisheries and Environmental Science, Policy, and Management.” The report provides a good overview of the difficulties of determining “best available science” and why frequently there are disagreements among scientists as well as between scientists and policymakers. In my book, Wildlife Politics, I have an entire chapter devoted to these issues concerning wildlife preservation. For example, use of different assumptions or different parameters in models can result in conflicting predictions about whether a species (e.g., wolverines) should be listed as endangered due to climate change. Inadequate data exist among many threatened species. There are many examples of political interference with and/or manipulation of science by agencies responsible for wildlife conservation. Scientific findings do not directly determine policy decisions but these decisions are made by public agencies and/or courts. Uncertainty and questions of the “burden of proof” also play a key role in affecting conservation decisions.
Conflict between cat lovers and wildlife conservationists is illustrated in the case of Ted Williams, a well-known Audubon Magazine columnist, who encouraged readers of the Orlando Sentinel to use tylenol to “euthanize” feral cats because they kill millions of birds. The Audubon Society suspended Williams for a short period of time but reinstanted him after he apologized. A member of “Ally Cats Allies” criticized the Audubon Society for reinstating him after only a short period. See coverage in Christine Haughy, (2013). “Writer, and Bird Lover, at Center of a Dispute About Cats Is Reinstated,” New York Times, March 26. Accessed 9/21/16 from http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/27/business/media/ted-williams-audubon-columnist-is-reinstated.html?_r=0
The killing of pests such as coyotes that are predators of livestock such as sheep has been the focus of a Federal agency now known as “Wildlife Services” (Note: it has gone through several name changes and bureaucratic locations—it is now located in the Department of Agriculture—Michael Robinson wrote a fascinating book about the agency titled Predatory Bureaucracy: The Extermination of Wolves and the Transformation of the West. Boulder: The University Press of Colorado, 2005.) Robinson’s book details how the agency developed a strong constituency of ranchers to support the development and growth of their agency and also protected them from attacks by environmentalists and challenges from the professional biological community. Richard Conniff recently wrote a New York Times article titled “American’s Wildlife Body Count” in which he cites research by Adrian Treves and associates that lethal controls are not as effective as non-lethal approaches and sometimes actually lead to worse predation. Conniff notes that despite the publication of the Treves et al. article (in Frontiers of Ecology and the Environment, Sept. 2016) calling into question the resutls of lethal controls, other authors, editors and peer reviewers continued to cite lethal control as effective despite these contrary results. Conniff notes that the Wildlife Services spends a significant amount of money but its reports only list its annual body count of predators but do not attempt to show the efficacy of their efforts. Conniff’s 2016 article praises the Obama Administration for ignoring objections by the State of Alaska in setting aside “73 million acres of national wildlife…off limits” to Alaska’s “withering attack on bears and wolves.” However, under the incoming Trump Administration, one can expect a return to extermination of wildlife considered to be “pests” or “varmints.” Conniff’s article in the New York Times (Sept. 2016) is available at http://www.nytimes.com/2016/09/18/opinion/sunday/americas-wildlife-body-count.html?emc=edit_tnt_20160917&nlid=10365419&tntemail0=y&_r=0
Researchers of the U.S. Geological Survey reported a study in the August 2016 issue of the Journal of Mammology. They found “widespread reduction in pika range in three mountainous regions including the Great Basin, southern Utah and northeastern California.” The causes of the reduction were studied and the researchers concluded that “…changes we have observed in pika distribution are primarily governed by climate.” Pikas are viewed as an “indicator” species to determine the effects of climate and other variables because “…they can be abundant, are easily detectable and active during the day, live in identifiable habitat, and are sensitive to climate change.” They concluded that climate change was the key variable, more important than other possible causes such as droughts and habitat area. A description of the study results is available at https://www.usgs.gov/news/pikas-disappearing-parts-west-due-climate-change-0 The study is significant since recently the effects of climate change on other mammals such as the wolverine have been disputed.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) monitoring of impacts on Sage Grouse: In order to monitor the success of protectons for the Sage Grouse protections reached in the agreement between the USFWS, BLM, and many state and local agencies as well as extractive industries, the BLM has issued detailed plans that are available at https://www.blm.gov/wo/st/en/info/newsroom/2016/september/nr_09_01_2016.html and
https://www.blm.gov/wo/st/en/info/regulations/Instruction_Memos_and_Bulletins/national_instruction/2016/IM_2016-145.html The BLM received “additional funding in Fiscal Year 2016 for geospatial data management including disturbance-related data”…such as “verifying proponent submitted spatial data (through aerial imagery, field inspections, or local knowledge); and incorporating SDARTT results into NEPA analysis.” This whole effort is now called into question with the election of Donald Trump because western states (won by Trump) have questioned the Sage Grouse measures and agreed to them due to the threat of imposition of Endangered Species Act listing. For example, the Wildlife Management Institutes notes that “There have been several efforts in Congress to undermine the land use plans. In addition to stand-alone legislation, language in the House-passed National Defense Authorization Act would give state governors the ability to preempt conservation plans on federal public lands.” The WMI coverage of this issue is available at https://wildlifemanagement.institute/outdoor-news-bulletin/september-2016/blm-directs-implementation-sage-grouse-plans |
During my research for the book, I noticed that there was no blog available for sharing informaton on wildlife conservation and thus I set up this blog to accomplish this purpose. Please share any informaticoncerning issues related to wildife policy and politics. I welcome feedback from users concerning this blog and website.
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