Forest Ranger & Conservation Officer

Forest Ranger

PROGRAM

PROJECT 3

Assisting those at the sharp end of conservation, the people tasked with implementing protected area policies in wilderness frontier zones

The humid lowland rainforest in the Madre de Dios region of Peru is experiencing rapid change as a result of human population growth, improved access in the form of new roads, and from the growing demand at national and global levels for forest and agricultural products. Tropical timber trees are being extracted, bushmeat species killed for sale in local markets, animals trapped and trafficked for the pet trade, and swathes of forest cut down and burnt to make way for cattle ranches and large fields of crops. These activities are now beginning to encroach on the many types of conservation areas (CAs) that currently protect in excess of 5 Million hectares (12 Million acres) of this the most biodiverse region of Peru and arguably of the Planet. Only active surveillance and protection measures, especially on the borders of these CAs, will prevent these forests and associated wilderness areas from further harm.

This region boasts six, large State-managed reserves and national parks (see map below) that together cover an expanse of 4 Million hectares (10 Million acres), as well as native community forests, conservation concessions, ecotourism concessions, Brazil nut concessions, and private conservation easements that total a further 1 Million hectares. Except for the most remote of conservation these, they are all under threat from human impacts and encroachment.

However, it is a fact that active presence of rangers and guards on the border areas of these conservation-focused forests, with a knowledge of environmental protection laws and due process, can significantly reduce the risk of illegal incursions into these areas. Therefore, implementing strategies to help achieve at least a minimum required level of "presence" in these border areas is important from a long-term forest and wildlife conservation point of view.

Aims and Objectives

To train and equip teams of rangers, guards, and their field assistants, to collect information on threat levels in conservation areas and to confront and collect the right sort of information with regards to illegal activities when encountered;

To map the distribution of potential threats and actual illegal incursions or evidence of incursions on the periphery and within the conservation areas we work with;

To help build, maintain, and equip the infrastructure, such as trail systems, satellite camps, and signage, located near the periphery of conservation areas where rangers, guards and their field assistants can stay for periods of up to several days, to ensure that harder-to-reach zones of a conservation area can be correctly monitored and evaluated for unwanted threats and incursions;

To collect information on the status of threatened wildlife, including timber trees, bushmeat species, pet trade species, and so forth, as a means of establishing baselines of population estimates for these, which in turn will help assess the status and trends within these species over time, which should provide evidence of whether conservation actions are working or not;

To develop and encourage rangers and guards to liaise with neighbouring landowners and communities, with the aim of growing a set of allies that would be in a position to help one another, as part of a strategy to reduce the absolute level of threats on a conservation area;

To determine which set of activities and their frequency of use on the part of rangers and guards has the best conservation outcomes, as a way to assess if certain conservation areas are best served by a specific set of activities or not.