Co-management agreements for land and resource management can be viewed as emerging forms of a participatory planning model. They strive for equal aboriginal involvement and result not only in more equitable management strategies, but also incorporate aboriginal worldviews and traditional knowledge. This type of planning model is an iterative learning process for all parties involved and is most effective when mechanisms and processes to develop a co-management agreement are situational and contextually appropriate to each location and aboriginal group involved. Co-management agreements should be valued as interim forms that bridge restrictions on and exclusion of aboriginal peoples’ use and influence in relation to land and natural resources, on one side, and complete control through self-government, on the other. This practicum assesses levels of co-management for two case studies by: reviewing relevant literature, analyzing the co-management agreements and plans of management and surveying key personnel at Uluru – Kata Tjuta National Park in Australia and the Gwaii Haanas National Park Reserve and Haida Heritage Site in Canada. The study does conclude that the degree of involvement of aboriginal participation is still wanting, but is higher than it would be if no such framework had been applied. To achieve the full benefits of equality in power distribution, the author suggests that co-management at the highest level should be negotiated either within or as part of land claims agreement or as part of a land title transfer to traditional owners.

The biocompatibility and biodegradability of poly(lactic acid) (PLA) facilitate its use in a variety of biomedical applications, ranging from sutures to drug delivery. However, uncontrolled interactions with cells and insufficient mechanical properties have prevented PLA from reaching its full potential as a scaffold for use in tissue engineering. Methods to improve the mechanical, chemical and biological properties of PLA are limited by the lack of functional groups along the backbone of the polymer. One possible approach towards overcoming these limitations involves the incorporation of functional groups into the backbone of the polymer through the copolymerization of monomers bearing protected functional groups. Deprotection and modification of these functional groups could provide the opportunity to direct the attachment of cells, and enhance to the physical properties of the polymer. We have developed a general methodology for the synthesis of lactide monomers substituted with protected functional groups (alcohols protected as benzyl ethers, amines protected as benzyl carbamates and carboxylic acids protected as benzyl esters). The monomers were homopolymerized, and copolymerized with lactide, and deprotected to give functional PLA copolymers with pendant hydroxyl, amine, and carboxyl groups. A thorough investigation of the chemical modification of PLA copolymers bearing functional groups along the polymer backbone was performed on a copolymer prepared by copolymerizarion of a dibenzyloxy-substituted lactide monomer with lactide followed by reductive debenzylation. Reaction of the resulting hydroxyl-substited PLA with succinic anhydride resulted in an acid-substituted PLA that is amenable to standard EDC/NHS coupling. The utility of this copolymer was illustrated by coupling with an amine derivative of biotin, and an RGD-containing peptide sequence. The preparation of the biodegradable polyester substituted with RGD, a ubiquitous adhesion peptide, provided us with control over cellular attachment to the hybrid material. We also explored approaches to make use of the pendant functional groups on PLA to enhance the physical properties of polymer foams. Copolymers with pendant photocrosslinkable cinnamate groups were prepared by reaction of the hydroxyl-substited PLA copolymers with cinnamoyl chloride. The copolymer was foamed using thermally-induced phase separation (TIPS), and photocrosslinked upon irradiation at 300 nm. Irradiation resulted in an increase in the compressive modulus of the foams. Crosslinking also led to a decrease in the rate of hydrolytic degradation of the foams, thereby demonstrating the potential for use of these strategies in the development of porous scaffolds for bioengineering. Another potential approach towards the preparation of robust polymer foams is the incorporation of a rigid polymer block which can phase separate during foam formation to provide additional structural integrity. Several poly(norbornene)-PLA diblock copolymer compositions were prepared by the ring-opening of lactide by a hydroxyl-terminated poly(norbornene) macroinitiator. The ability of the diblock copolymer to phase separate at elevated temperature was verified using small-angle x-ray scattering and wide-angle x-ray scattering.

There are concerns that many national parks worldwide are ineffective at conserving biological diversity and ecosystem processes, are socially unjust in their relations with Indigenous communities, or both. This dissertation asks: can national parks protect ecological integrity and concurrently address social equity issues? It presents empirical results of a systematic evaluation of six case study national parks in Canada and South Africa. Purposive sampling was used to select the six case study national parks. Data sources included State of the Park Reports; park ecological monitoring data; archival data; and semi-structured interviews with park biologists, managers, and Indigenous members of park co-management boards. Status and trend assessments and effectiveness evaluations of park ecological monitoring data were used to evaluate how effectively the parks addressed three ecological integrity criteria. Results show that all six parks effectively addressed the priority indicators for which they had monitoring data. However, the effectiveness ratings of each park decreased when all indicators, including those identified as priorities but lacking monitoring data, were analysed. This indicates that the parks had generally identified more priority indicators than they were actually able to address (for reasons including lack of budget or trained staff, managerial challenges). Thematic coding of semi-structured interview and archival data, and the assignation of numerical ratings to these data, were used to evaluate how effectively the parks addressed three equity criteria. Results show that all but one of the case study parks were equitable, parks with more comprehensive co-management and support from neighbouring Indigenous groups were more equitable than parks with lower levels of co-management, the parks with settled land claims were not necessarily more equitable overall, and a few parks were found to be co-managed in name only. The overall results of this evaluation demonstrate that parks effective at protecting ecological integrity can also successfully address social equity, but that further efforts to integrate these two realms are both possible and necessary. A logical starting point would be to build upon those existing integrative processes already institutionalised in many parks and protected areas: the co-management and integrated conservation and development efforts.

This thesis provides the first direct comparison between – and integration of – community-based and science-based approaches to the establishment of marine protected areas (MPAs). MPAs are one potentially effective conservation tool, but are being established very slowly. My research shows that community involvement in placing MPAs can help meet many ecological goals, although biophysical data improve the conservation value of sitings. To assess the need for MPAs in British Columbia (BC), Canada, I mapped stressors resulting from human activities. This produced a powerful rationale for MPAs: very little of the ocean, and almost none of the continental shelf of BC, lies beyond the reach of human stressors. My work helps reconcile differing perspectives about the efficacy of community-based vs. science-based MPA selection. I explored and analyzed these approaches, separately and together, in two areas in BC. First, I generated a community-based plan for MPA placement through partnerships with two First Nations (indigenous peoples) in BC. They offered strong support for spatial protection measures, and individuals nominated overlapping areas. Second, I applied a decision support tool (Marxan) to determine MPA placement under scientific precepts. Conservation planning usually lacks detailed ecological information but the Marxan approach was robust to some missing data; in such cases, it was best to use available abiotic and biotic data to ensure that both habitats and species were represented. Third, I integrated community-based and science-based approaches, to find that they verified and complemented each other. Indeed, an integration of the two was preferred by participants and also achieved all conservation objectives. Finally, I took a novel and pragmatic approach to ocean zoning. I used spatial data for thirteen commercial fisheries on Canada’s west coast to select areas where fishing should be permitted, rather than prohibiting fishing under a MPA paradigm. The results revealed that small reductions in fisheries yields, if judiciously selected, could allow creation of large unfished areas that embraced diverse biophysical regions and habitat types. Such a pragmatic approach could achieve remarkable conservation gains.

A systematic approach to planning, decision-making and management has become best-practice in conservation over the past two of decades. The field of ‘systematic conservation planning’ is concerned with identifying cost-effective places and actions to protect biological diversity. Past research has focused on static assessments. However, given the fact that biological diversity and processes that threaten its persistence vary in space and time, conservation assessments might need to be made in a dynamic context. In addition, we must explicitly account for the trade-offs associated with implementing conservation actions and investing in improved knowledge and learning to reduce uncertainty on where, how and when to act. The aim of this thesis was to develop novel approaches for accounting for both ecosystem dynamics and uncertainty in conservation planning. Ecosystems are generally treated as static in conservation planning despite many being spatially and temporally dynamic. For example, pelagic marine ecosystems are quite dynamic because ecological processes, such as eddies, that produce resources that many species depend on can be erratic. In chapter two we explored the issue of developing a system of fixed protected areas that consider the physical and biological dynamics typical of the pelagic realm. The approach was to maximize the representation of key fisheries species and species of conservation concern due to significant declines in their abundance, within a network of protected areas. We also ensured that protected area design reflected system dynamics and this was achieved by representing key oceanographic process (such as upwellings and eddies), and biological processes (such as the abundance of small pelagic fish) in protected areas. To account for the variability where these processes occur, we used time series data to find both predictable areas and anomalies, assuming that their past location was somewhat reflective of their future locations. Implementing conservation actions that are fixed in space and time are probably not the most effective strategy in ecosystems that are dynamic. This is because of the movements of particular species. For example, many species have distributions and abundances that change seasonally and might only require temporary management in particular areas. In chapter three, we tested the utility of three approaches to implementing fisheries closures to reduce bycatch in the South African Longline Fishery; 1) time closures, 2) permanent spatial closures and 3) episodic spatial closures. In chapter three, we identified these closures using an existing database containing catch and bycatch data from 1998 to 2005. There was variation where and when different species were caught as bycatch, and it was determined seasonal area closures were the best strategy. This was because it achieved the same conservation objectives for bycatch species as the other types of closures, but impacted less on the long-lining industry. While this result is intuitive, it demonstrated quantitatively, how much more effective moveable management can be. Decisions on where conservation actions are implemented are always based on incomplete knowledge about biological diversity. It is generally assumed that gathering more data is a good investment for conservation planning. However, data can take time and incur costs to collect and given habitat loss, there are both costs and benefits associated with different levels of investments in knowledge versus conservation implementation. In chapter four, the aim was to determine the return on investment from spending different amounts on survey data before undertaking a program of implementing new protected areas. We found that, after an investment of only US$100,000, there was little increase in the effectiveness of conservation actions, despite the full species dataset costing at least 25 times that amount. Surveying can take time because of expertise limitations, logistics and funding shortfalls. Biological diversity may be lost while data collection occurs conversely, not collecting enough data can lead to erroneous decisions. Additionally, resources spent on learning may be better spent on other actions. In chapter five, in a series of retrospective simulations, we compared the impact of spending different amounts of time collecting biological data prior to the implementation of new protected areas. The aim was to find the optimal survey period given the trade-off between gaining knowledge to improve conservation decisions while there is concurrent loss of habitat. We discovered that surveying beyond two years rarely increased the effectiveness of conservation decisions, despite a substantial increase in the knowledge of species distributions. Often there are choices between different actions and uncertainty as to which are the most effective. In chapter six, we discuss how the principles of adaptive management might be applied to conservation planning. Improving future management decisions through learning should be viewed as essential in all conservation plans but such learning is often included as a minor step, or is completely ignored. In this chapter we provide a brief overview of an adaptive framework for conservation planning and ideas for future research.

No description available.

Much of the discourse on cultural change has been descriptive and explanatory, with few attempts to be predictive. Where indicators of and buffers to change are identified, they tend only to be post-event assessable. The need for a tool with strong predictive power is fundamental to cultural (and environmental) impact assessment and the rationale behind this developmental work. Focusing on traditional cultures and their environmental context, and based on a case study of the Juatinga Ecological Reserve, Brasil, this research advances knowledge on modelling cultural and environmental changes, and how to manage these changes for accepted goals. A heuristic tool is presented for assessing the impacts of pressures on a culture and its related environment as well as the efficacy of management responses. This tool is associated with methods to assist in developing predictive models representing the change processes. The change model building process involves consulting stakeholders as a way of integrating different perceptions, to identify pressures, responses and links associated with cultural and environmental change. This assists in creating a co-learning environment, which facilitates communication between stakeholders. The change modelling approach permits incorporation of the complexity and uncertainty of the system represented, and enables scenario analyses. These allow expected local and flow-on impacts of management interventions to be tested. This approach is more efficient than stand-alone performance indicators that do not allow for the synergic impacts of management interventions to be observed and assessed. Using the models representing the cultural and environmental change processes of the Caiçaras of the Juatinga Ecological Reserve, this research identifies that tourism is a major pressure for change (at that locality). This study also identified that tourist numbers at new and small tourism destinations, as well as on a continental scale, can be forecast using exponential and polynomial functions. Yet, tourism flow may be perturbed at any given time by, for example, acts of violence and when the type of marketing changes. In addition, tourist numbers cannot be greater than the total population, therefore it cannot grow indefinitely as exponential and polynomial functions suggest. Hence, the use of exponential and polynomial functions to forecast tourist numbers is more reliable for short periods, such as four or five years, and when based on six or more sets of data points. The greatest contribution of this research to the cultural change discourse is its innovative approach to study, forecast and manage cultural and environmental changes. The continuation of this research may lead to identifying general theories relating pressures and responses to indicators of cultural and environmental changes.

A systematic approach to planning, decision-making and management has become best-practice in conservation over the past two of decades. The field of ‘systematic conservation planning’ is concerned with identifying cost-effective places and actions to protect biological diversity. Past research has focused on static assessments. However, given the fact that biological diversity and processes that threaten its persistence vary in space and time, conservation assessments might need to be made in a dynamic context. In addition, we must explicitly account for the trade-offs associated with implementing conservation actions and investing in improved knowledge and learning to reduce uncertainty on where, how and when to act. The aim of this thesis was to develop novel approaches for accounting for both ecosystem dynamics and uncertainty in conservation planning. Ecosystems are generally treated as static in conservation planning despite many being spatially and temporally dynamic. For example, pelagic marine ecosystems are quite dynamic because ecological processes, such as eddies, that produce resources that many species depend on can be erratic. In chapter two we explored the issue of developing a system of fixed protected areas that consider the physical and biological dynamics typical of the pelagic realm. The approach was to maximize the representation of key fisheries species and species of conservation concern due to significant declines in their abundance, within a network of protected areas. We also ensured that protected area design reflected system dynamics and this was achieved by representing key oceanographic process (such as upwellings and eddies), and biological processes (such as the abundance of small pelagic fish) in protected areas. To account for the variability where these processes occur, we used time series data to find both predictable areas and anomalies, assuming that their past location was somewhat reflective of their future locations. Implementing conservation actions that are fixed in space and time are probably not the most effective strategy in ecosystems that are dynamic. This is because of the movements of particular species. For example, many species have distributions and abundances that change seasonally and might only require temporary management in particular areas. In chapter three, we tested the utility of three approaches to implementing fisheries closures to reduce bycatch in the South African Longline Fishery; 1) time closures, 2) permanent spatial closures and 3) episodic spatial closures. In chapter three, we identified these closures using an existing database containing catch and bycatch data from 1998 to 2005. There was variation where and when different species were caught as bycatch, and it was determined seasonal area closures were the best strategy. This was because it achieved the same conservation objectives for bycatch species as the other types of closures, but impacted less on the long-lining industry. While this result is intuitive, it demonstrated quantitatively, how much more effective moveable management can be. Decisions on where conservation actions are implemented are always based on incomplete knowledge about biological diversity. It is generally assumed that gathering more data is a good investment for conservation planning. However, data can take time and incur costs to collect and given habitat loss, there are both costs and benefits associated with different levels of investments in knowledge versus conservation implementation. In chapter four, the aim was to determine the return on investment from spending different amounts on survey data before undertaking a program of implementing new protected areas. We found that, after an investment of only US$100,000, there was little increase in the effectiveness of conservation actions, despite the full species dataset costing at least 25 times that amount. Surveying can take time because of expertise limitations, logistics and funding shortfalls. Biological diversity may be lost while data collection occurs conversely, not collecting enough data can lead to erroneous decisions. Additionally, resources spent on learning may be better spent on other actions. In chapter five, in a series of retrospective simulations, we compared the impact of spending different amounts of time collecting biological data prior to the implementation of new protected areas. The aim was to find the optimal survey period given the trade-off between gaining knowledge to improve conservation decisions while there is concurrent loss of habitat. We discovered that surveying beyond two years rarely increased the effectiveness of conservation decisions, despite a substantial increase in the knowledge of species distributions. Often there are choices between different actions and uncertainty as to which are the most effective. In chapter six, we discuss how the principles of adaptive management might be applied to conservation planning. Improving future management decisions through learning should be viewed as essential in all conservation plans but such learning is often included as a minor step, or is completely ignored. In this chapter we provide a brief overview of an adaptive framework for conservation planning and ideas for future research.

Much of the discourse on cultural change has been descriptive and explanatory, with few attempts to be predictive. Where indicators of and buffers to change are identified, they tend only to be post-event assessable. The need for a tool with strong predictive power is fundamental to cultural (and environmental) impact assessment and the rationale behind this developmental work. Focusing on traditional cultures and their environmental context, and based on a case study of the Juatinga Ecological Reserve, Brasil, this research advances knowledge on modelling cultural and environmental changes, and how to manage these changes for accepted goals. A heuristic tool is presented for assessing the impacts of pressures on a culture and its related environment as well as the efficacy of management responses. This tool is associated with methods to assist in developing predictive models representing the change processes. The change model building process involves consulting stakeholders as a way of integrating different perceptions, to identify pressures, responses and links associated with cultural and environmental change. This assists in creating a co-learning environment, which facilitates communication between stakeholders. The change modelling approach permits incorporation of the complexity and uncertainty of the system represented, and enables scenario analyses. These allow expected local and flow-on impacts of management interventions to be tested. This approach is more efficient than stand-alone performance indicators that do not allow for the synergic impacts of management interventions to be observed and assessed. Using the models representing the cultural and environmental change processes of the Caiçaras of the Juatinga Ecological Reserve, this research identifies that tourism is a major pressure for change (at that locality). This study also identified that tourist numbers at new and small tourism destinations, as well as on a continental scale, can be forecast using exponential and polynomial functions. Yet, tourism flow may be perturbed at any given time by, for example, acts of violence and when the type of marketing changes. In addition, tourist numbers cannot be greater than the total population, therefore it cannot grow indefinitely as exponential and polynomial functions suggest. Hence, the use of exponential and polynomial functions to forecast tourist numbers is more reliable for short periods, such as four or five years, and when based on six or more sets of data points. The greatest contribution of this research to the cultural change discourse is its innovative approach to study, forecast and manage cultural and environmental changes. The continuation of this research may lead to identifying general theories relating pressures and responses to indicators of cultural and environmental changes.

Protected areas are one of the main tourist attractions and home to many poor people living in and around them in many developing countries. Tourism development in such areas requires linking nature conservation with poverty elimination. Although attracting more concern, the actual benefits accessible to the local poor is inevitably neglected or misunderstood. This work identifies the correlation between tourism and poverty alleviation by tracing the cash flows to the local poor, review the social and environmental effects of tourism on the local area and establishes a community-based sustainable tourism-eliminating poverty strategy framework. The case study was conducted in a group of protected areas in the Qinling Mountain Region in Western China. The study focuses on local poor people, but does not exclude other stakeholders. Since the case study region is a typical representation of the combination and overlapping of the multiple needs for tourism development, poverty reduction and biodiversity conservation, which are faced by many other developing countries in the world, it is expected that the findings and recommendations can be applied to other regions in China, as well as other developing countries.