Topic: protected areas

Experts and innovators meet to chart the future of ecosystem conservation

Current use valuation programs can encourage landowners to resist development pressures and leave forest as forest.

This paper explores current use valuation programs as one tool for conserving and fostering sustainable management of southern U.S. forests under private ownership. The brief identifies key constraints on existing programs and suggests measures that could be implemented to enhance program effectiveness.

Source: DuMoulin, Andrew. 2011. Winning Open Space Ballot Measures. The Trust for Public Land LandVote® Database. The Trust for Public Land.

A new WRI report explores what makes public ballot measures successful and how they can help conserve forests in the U.S. South.

From 1988 through 2010, 354 measures were proposed across the 13 states of the U.S. South.

This issue brief explores the potential of conservation-related ballot measures as a tool to protect forests. It defines conservation-related ballot measures, summarizes their nationwide track record, assesses their application in the Southern United States, and makes recommendations to increase their utilization in the South in the future.

This issue brief provides an overview of how public land, including forestland, can be “put to work” to earn revenue from one or more ecosystem service market opportunities. Working forest revenue sources include sustainable timber production, recreation and hunting fees, and – to the extent that management activities enhance environmental quality – payments for carbon sequestration, endangered species habitats, and/or water quality.

Two new leaders, Nigel Sizer and Robert Winterbottom, added to roster

The issue brief provides an overview of how businesses and water utilities in the United States and Latin America are pursuing upstream forest conservation as a cost-effective means of ensuring clean water supplies. It also suggests how many of these approaches could be applicable in the southern United States.

Reefs at Risk Revisited” report presents comprehensive analysis of threats to coral reefs

“Reefs at Risk Revisited” report presents comprehensive analysis of threats to coral reefs

It’s time to raise awareness of the variety of incentives that can help forest owners in the southern U.S. keep their land.

This issue brief provides an overview of incentives, markets, and practices that can promote conservation and sustainable management in the forests of the southern United States.

This series of issue briefs explores incentives for ensuring that southern U.S. forests continue to supply the timber, water, recreation, and other benefits—known as “ecosystem services”—that people depend upon.