Aaron Bruner

Financial Costs and Shortfalls of Managing and Expanding Protected-Area Systems in Developing Countries

Abstract Underfunding jeopardizes the ability of protected areas to safeguard biodiversity and the benefits that intact nature provides to society. In this article, we evaluate the cost of effectively managing all existing protected areas in developing countries, as well as the cost of expansion into high-priority new areas. We find that recent studies converge on a funding shortfall of

Comparing climate and cost impacts of reference levels for reducing emissions from deforestation.

1 billion to

Effectiveness of parks in protecting tropical biodiversity.

1.7 billion per year to manage all existing areas. The costs of establishing and managing an expanded protected-area system would total at least

Economic reasons for conserving wild nature

4 billion per year over the next decade, an amount that far exceeds current spending but is well within the reach of the international community. These findings indicate the need for rapid action to mobilize significant new resources for the developing worlds protected areas. In particular, this will require (a) the use of a range of tools to generate funds and improve efficiency of management; (b) greater precision and better communication of the costs and benefits of protected areas, both locally and globally; and (c) increased, stable support from developed countries for on-the-ground management of protected-area systems in developing countries.

The pandas' habitat at Wolong nature reserve

The climate benefit and economic cost of an international mechanism for reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD) will depend on the design of reference levels for crediting emission reductions. We compare the impacts of six proposed reference level designs on emission reduction levels and on cost per emission reduction using a stylized partial equilibrium model (the open source impacts of REDD incentives spreadsheet; OSIRIS). The model explicitly incorporates national incentives to participate in an international REDD mechanism as well as international leakage of deforestation emissions. Our results show that a REDD mechanism can provide cost-efficient climate change mitigation benefits under a broad range of reference level designs. We find that the most effective reference level designs balance incentives to reduce historically high deforestation emissions with incentives to maintain historically low deforestation emissions. Estimates of emission reductions under REDD depend critically on the degree to which demand for tropical frontier agriculture generates leakage. This underscores the potential importance to REDD of complementary strategies to supply agricultural needs outside of the forest frontier.