Today we’re taking a look at what works in conservation. That’s what we always aim to do here at the Mongabay Newscast, of course, but today we’re talking about the latest iteration of a report titled “What Works In Conservation” that has just been released by the Conservation Evidence Group based at the University of Cambridge in the UK.

As the impacts of environmental crises like climate change, biodiversity loss, and habitat destruction become ever more apparent, there is a growing movement to evaluate what works and what doesn’t in order to better direct precious conservation funds toward the most beneficial and effective activities. Mongabay’s Conservation Effectiveness series, for instance, looks at the scientific evidence for a number of strategies, including forest certification, protected areas, and payments for ecosystem services.

But the Cambridge Conservation Evidence team’s “What Works In Conservation” is probably the most comprehensive resource on the scientific evidence for the effectiveness of conservation strategies currently available. The “What Works In Conservation” report provides expert assessments of the scientific evidence for conservation actions targeted at safeguarding the future of a range of species groups and habitat types, from amphibians and terrestrial mammals to forests and peatland. All of the assessments in the report are available via a searchable database at conservationevidence.com, or the 2021 report can be downloaded as a free PDF or purchased as a hard copy from Open Book Publishers.

Our guests today include Andrew Bladon, a research associate with the Conservation Evidence Group, who’s here to tell us about what’s new in the “What Works In Conservation 2021” report, how the Group and its panel of experts evaluate scientific evidence of conservation initiatives, and why it’s so important that that evidence is continually reevaluated.

We also welcome to the program Hiromi Yamashita, a professor at Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University in Japan and a visiting professor at the Cambridge Conservation Initiative. She tells us about her work to include assessments of how traditional and local knowledge benefit conservation initiatives, especially around coastal conservation projects, into the “What Works in Conservation” report. Given the growing recognition of indigenous and local communities’ importance to the success of conservation, it’s particularly interesting to hear about the challenges of incorporating traditional and local knowledge into the Conservation Evidence Group’s work.

If you enjoy the Mongabay Newscast, we ask that you please consider becoming a monthly sponsor via our Patreon page, at patreon.com/mongabay. Just a dollar per month will really help us offset the production costs and hosting fees, so if you’re a fan of our audio reports from nature’s frontline, please support the Mongabay Newscast at patreon.com/mongabay.

You can subscribe to the Mongabay Newscast wherever you get your podcasts from. You can also listen to all episodes here on the Mongabay website. Or you can download our new app for Apple and Android devices to gain fingertip access to new shows and all our previous episodes.

Follow Mike Gaworecki on Twitter: @mikeg2001

FEEDBACK: Use this form to send a message to the author of this post. If you want to post a public comment, you can do that at the bottom of the page.