{"id":804,"date":"2026-01-21T12:24:52","date_gmt":"2026-01-21T12:24:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/?p=804"},"modified":"2026-01-21T15:42:50","modified_gmt":"2026-01-21T15:42:50","slug":"does-conservation-last-conservation-abandonment-as-a-policy-blind-spot","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/2026\/01\/21\/does-conservation-last-conservation-abandonment-as-a-policy-blind-spot\/","title":{"rendered":"Does Conservation Last? Conservation abandonment as a policy blind spot"},"content":{"rendered":"

The last year has been turbulent for\u00a0international cooperation, with growing erosion of commitments to protect and restore the natural world.\u00a0High-profile cuts to international aid budgets have had cascading impacts on conservation worldwide\u00a0(e.g.,\u00a0<\/span>last year’s USAID cuts<\/span><\/a>). Where these funding gaps have not been filled, many initiatives have been scaled back or stopped entirely.<\/span><\/p>\n

But\u00a0this\u00a0isn\u2019t\u00a0a new phenomenon.\u00a0Rather, these recent cuts\u00a0reveal\u00a0how precarious and short-lived many conservation initiatives are.\u00a0This is the focus of our new article in\u00a0<\/span>Nature Ecology & Evolution<\/span><\/i>:\u00a0<\/span>Conservation abandonment is a policy blind spot<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

By \u201cconservation abandonment\u201d, we mean situations where conservation efforts are quietly or formally left to fail. This can include both informal abdication of management responsibilities (e.g., park managers failing to fulfil their duties) and formal rollback of protections (e.g., removal of environmental legislation). For example, during my PhD, I visited forests in Uganda where active Collaborative Forest Management agreements with communities existed on paper. However, many residents I spoke to either didn\u2019t know about the initiative or didn\u2019t realise it was still active, even though the agreements remained on paper. Somewhere along the lines, those responsible for maintaining and managing the initiative stopped doing so, illustrating an informal abdication of management responsibilities.<\/span><\/p>\n

Abandonment is not always a bad thing. For instance, an irrevocably ineffective initiative should probably be terminated, as should those that actively harm people and their rights. Some have argued that core elements of mainstream conservation need to be rethought entirely and <\/span>replaced\u00a0with\u00a0more experimental or alternative approaches<\/span><\/a>.\u00a0In other cases, an initiative may be\u00a0terminated\u00a0because it is no longer needed, for example,\u00a0if the pressures it was\u00a0designed\u00a0to address have\u00a0faded\u00a0or disappeared.<\/span><\/p>\n

Yet, in many cases, abandonment risks reversing hard-won gains and, if untracked, distorting perceptions of progress towards conservation goals. It also risks misallocating investment toward new conservation initiatives while underinvesting in the durability and effectiveness of existing ones. As a result, abandonment \u2013 particularly when unplanned, unjustified, and untracked \u2013 is often harmful.<\/span><\/p>\n

Most\u00a0research\u00a0on conservation abandonment focuses on protected areas, such as national parks or reserves.\u00a0For example,\u00a0<\/span>previous research<\/span><\/a> found that, globally, protected areas totalling nearly the area of Greenland have been downgraded, downsized or degazetted since 1892 \u2013 a process known as PADDD. Similarly, the issue of \u201cpaper parks\u201d \u2013 protected areas that remain in legislation but lack on-the-ground management \u2013 has been recognised for decades, though we still know relatively little about their prevalence, drivers, and consequences.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
Figure 1: The left column shows three forms of abdication of management responsibilities. Abdication refers to a failure to meet a specific duty or set of duties while legal, contractual or other formal responsibilities remain in place. The right column shows three corresponding forms of reversal that weaken, reduce or remove the legislative, policy, contractual or other formal arrangements that underpin conservation. This typology builds on previous work on protected areas (e.g., here and here).<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

At the same time, conservation efforts extend well beyond just protected areas. The Global Biodiversity Framework \u2013 an international agreement adopted in 2022 \u2013 includes 23 targets that span a diverse range of goals, such as mitigating the introduction of invasive species, reducing biodiversity-harming pollution and promoting sustainable use of plants and wildlife. Meeting these targets will require a diverse mix of regulatory and voluntary initiatives. Yet, there is virtually no systematic understanding of the extent, patterns, or trends of abandonment across the range of conservation initiatives beyond protected areas.<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u00a0can\u00a0sometimes\u00a0be hard to tell if\u00a0some\u00a0initiative\u00a0has been abandoned.\u00a0For instance,\u00a0in some contexts,\u00a0specific projects and grants might end, while management activities persist and change locally\u00a0over time.\u00a0This issue is potentially\u00a0exacerbated\u00a0by\u00a0the need to\u00a0<\/span>repackage the\u00a0same management activities\u00a0as novel innovations<\/span><\/a> to secure funding and support.<\/span><\/p>\n

But there are initiatives that\u00a0clearly do\u00a0persist over time.\u00a0For instance, after graduating from Bangor\u00a0University in 2012,\u00a0I was lucky enough to secure a role at\u00a0Ya\u2019axch\u00e9\u00a0Conservation Trust\u00a0in Belize. For\u00a0a number of\u00a0years,\u00a0Ya\u2019axch\u00e9\u00a0had been working with local farmers\u00a0to produce\u00a0shade-tolerant cacao\u00a0that\u00a0protects\u00a0forest cover and biodiversity.\u00a0Many farmers then sold their produce to\u00a0Maya Mountain Cacao, a certified B Corp, which then exports the dried beans to speciality\u00a0chocolate makers around the\u00a0world.\u00a0Nearly 15\u00a0years later,\u00a0<\/span>this model is still going strong<\/span><\/a>, continuing to benefit farmers while protecting Belize\u2019s Maya Golden Landscape.<\/span><\/p>\n

This agroforestry model lasted, in part, because it offered clear, tangible benefits to those involved. This case starkly contrasts with the examples of Collaborative Forest Management agreements I mentioned earlier.<\/span><\/p>\n

Often, practitioners on the ground are acutely aware of the issues of conservation abandonment and its impacts on people and nature. But this understanding does not always translate to policy and science. If conservation efforts are to last, we need to pay much closer attention to when and why they fade away. That means better tracking of abandonment and a clearer understanding of its causes. A greater focus on this issue is necessary, perhaps now more than ever, given the global turbulence that conservation will need to weather in the coming years.<\/span><\/p>\n

_<\/p>\n

For more information about Dr Thomas Pienkowski and his research, visit his profile<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The last year has been turbulent for\u00a0international cooperation, with growing erosion of commitments to protect and restore the natural world.\u00a0High-profile cuts to international aid budgets … Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83585,"featured_media":810,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[70],"tags":[6599,303104,70],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83585"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=804"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":813,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/804\/revisions\/813"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/810"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=804"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=804"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.kent.ac.uk\/dice\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=804"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}