Fernanda Figueroa

Effectiveness of natural protected areas to prevent land use and land cover change in Mexico

This study evaluated the extent to which natural protected areas (NPAs) in Mexico have been effective for preventing land use/land cover change, considered as a major cause of other degradation processes. We developed an effectiveness index including NPA percentage of transformed areas (agriculture, induced vegetation, forestry plantations, and human settlements) in 2002, the rate and absolute extent of change in these areas (1993–2002), the comparison between rates of change observed inside the NPA and in an equivalent surrounding area, and between the NPA and the state(s) in which it is located. We chose 69 terrestrial federal NPAs, decreed before 1997, that were larger than 1,000 ha, not urban/reforested with non-native vegetation, not islands and not coastal strips, and estimated the extent of transformed areas using 1993 and 2002 land use/land cover maps. Over 54% of NPAs were effective, and were heterogeneously distributed by management categories: 65% of Biosphere Reserves, 53% of Flora and Fauna Protection Areas, and 45% of National Parks. 23% of NPAs were regarded as weakly effective, and the remaining 23% as non-effective. We recognize the importance of NPAs as a relevant conservation instrument, as half of NPAs analyzed (particularly biosphere reserves) prevented natural vegetation loss compared with their geographic context. Our results suggest that conservation based on NPAs in Mexico still faces significant challenges. Our approach can be expanded for evaluating the effectiveness of NPA in other regions, as land use/land cover maps are now available almost worldwide.

Socioeconomic context of land use and land cover change in Mexican biosphere reserves.

SUMMARY Land use/land cover change (LULC) is a major threat to natural protected areas worldwide. This paper explores the relationships between four estimated LULC parameters for 17 Mexican biosphere reserves (BRs) for 1993‐2002 on a GIS platform, and ten socioeconomic factors obtained from census data. These relationships were tested through linear correlations and multivariate analysis. BRs showed lower human demographic pressure, but higher population dispersion, social marginality, percentage of rain-fed agriculture area, and dependence upon agriculture and cattle compared to nationwide values. BRs also varied in their indigenous population, and showed cattle overpopulation, and low immigration androaddensity.Socioeconomicfactorsexplained87% of LULC variation. High population and road density, cattle overpopulation and low percentage indigenous population were related to percentage of transformed area (2002). Conversely, small population and road density, large proportion of indigenous population and high dependency on agriculture and cattle, were related to the rate of change in transformed area (1993‐2002). High human population growth and urban concentration occurred when BRs suffered higher LULC than their corresponding ecoregions. Including socioeconomic conditions prevailing in BRs and their influence on LULC in reserve management and rural development planning will improve strategies for the confluence of conservation and development goals.

Geographic patterns of body-mass diversity in Mexican mammals

At the geographic scale, body mass has been analysed as a correlate of local abundance and area of range, or in terms of latitudinal variations in body mass, both intra- and interspecifically. One productive approach has been the analysis of the frequency distribution of body mass in animal assemblages at different spatial scales. In this paper we use such an approach to describe the geographic patterns of body-mass diversity in the Mexican mammalian fauna. We found contrasting patterns for bats and non-volant species: Non-volant mammals in Mexico followed the already described pattern of a right-skewed distribution of body size at large scales and a more even distribution at smaller scales; bats, in contrast, showed skewed distributions at all scales. Statistical tests based on null models demonstrated that most assemblages of non-volant mammals present higher diversity of body mass than expected by chance, whereas chiropteran assemblages show the variation in body size that would be expected from randomly sampling the whole fauna of the country. Although we found an effect of latitude on body-mass diversity, we also demonstrated that topographic features (peninsulas and mountain ranges) have a strong influence on the patterns of body mass at small scales. Using SHE analysis, a method to decompose the elements of diversity, we studied the scaling of body-mass diversity in south-eastern Mexico and documented subtle patterns that had not been observed in comparisons between biomes and local communities. In particular, we found that at intermediate scales the evenness of the distribution of body mass values remains constant, so diversity is determined chiefly by changes in the number of size classes found in the assemblages. In contrast, at the national level, diversity is comparatively low, despite the presence of all size classes, because of the low evenness, reflected in the highly skewed frequency distribution of body-mass values. Our results show that the body-mass structure of mammalian assemblages is determined by a complex interplay of local and regional processes that act at different spatial and temporal scales.

Inclusion and Exclusion in Participation Strategies in the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve, Chiapas, Mexico

Since the 1970s, community participation has become central in biodiversity conservation initiatives, mainly as a strategy for integrating the needs and interests of the populations living in and around protected areas (PAs), and to enhance local social development. Nevertheless, institutionalised participation is usually conceived as a means to attain the goals of conservation initiatives. Although important efforts have been made to construct participatory processes, these are designed and implemented in ways that produce exclusion. In this study, we analyse the exclusion processes produced in the consultation workshops developed to evaluate and update the Conservation and Management Programme (CMP) of the Montes Azules Biosphere Reserve (MABR), and in the Reserves Advisory Council (Consejo Asesor) meetings. Our analysis is based on the observation of two workshops, the revision of workshop reports, interviews with institutional officials, and the participation of one of us in the Advisory Council of the MABR as a councillor. We show that participatory processes for incorporating local populations views and perspectives into decision-making processes still face important challenges. We highlight the importance of acknowledging, and attending to, the processes of exclusion generated by the mechanisms themselves, despite being implemented to include local communities.

Not the same for everyone: Community views of Mexico's payment for environmental services programmes

LUCIA ALMEIDA-LEÑERO 1 , D ANIEL R EVO L L O -FER NÁNDEZ 2, 3 , ANGELA CARO-BORRERO 1 , I SABEL RUIZ-MALLÉN 4, 5 , ESTEVE CORBERA 4, 6 , MARISA MAZARI-HIRIART 2 AND F E R N A N D A F I G U E R O A 1 ∗ 1Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Facultad de Ciencias – Departamento de Ecología y Recursos Naturales, Mexico City, Mexico, 2Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Instituto de Ecología, Mexico City, Mexico, 3CONACYT-Universidad Autónoma Metropolitana, Unidad Azcapotzalco, Mexico City, Mexico, 4Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona – Institut de Ciència i Tecnologia Ambientals Bellaterra, Barcelona, Spain, 5Internet Interdisciplinary Institute (IN3), Universitat Oberta de Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain and 6Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona – Department of Economics and Economic History, Barcelona, Spain Date submitted: 14 October 2015; Date accepted: 1 December 2016