Natural resource manager perceptions of agency performance on climate change.

An important precursor to the adoption of climate change adaptation strategies is to understand the perceived capacity to implement and operationalize such strategies. Utilizing an importance-performance analysis (IPA) evaluation framework, this article presents a comparative case study of federal and state land and natural resource manager perceptions of agency performance on factors influencing adaptive capacity in two U.S. regions (northern Colorado and southwestern South Dakota). Results revealed several important findings with substantial management implications. First, none of the managers ranked the adaptive capacity factors as a low priority. Second, managers held the perception that their agencies were performing either neutrally or poorly on most factors influencing adaptive capacity. Third, gap analysis revealed that significant improvements are required to facilitate optimal agency functioning when dealing with climate change-related management issues. Overall, results suggest that a host of institutional and policy-oriented (e.g., lack of clear mandate to adapt to climate change), financial and human resource (e.g., inadequate staff and financial resources), informational (e.g., inadequate research and monitoring programs) and contextual barriers (e.g., sufficient regional networks to mitigate potential transboundary impacts) currently challenge the efficient and effective integration of climate change into decision-making and management within agencies working in these regions. The IPA framework proved to be an effective tool to help managers identify and understand agency strengths, areas of concern, redundancies, and areas that warrant the use of limited funds and/or resource re-allocation in order to enhance adaptive capacity and maximize management effectiveness with respect to climate change.

An Urgent Call to Integrate the Health Sector into the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework.

There is a rapidly closing window of opportunity to stop biodiversity loss and secure the resilience of all life on Earth. In December 2022, Parties to the United Nations (UN) Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) will meet in Montreal, Canada, to finalize the language and terms of the Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework (Post-2020 GBF). The Post-2020 GBF aims to address the shortcomings of the previous Strategic Plan on Biodiversity 2011-2020, by introducing a Theory of Change, that states that biodiversity protection will only be successful if unprecedented, transformative changes are implemented effectively by Parties to the CBD. In this policy perspective, we explore the implications of the Theory of Change chosen to underpin the Post-2020 GBF, specifically that broad social transformation is an outcome that requires actors to be specified. We detail how the health sector is uniquely positioned to be an effective actor and ally in support of the implementation of the Post-2020 GBF. Specifically, we highlight how the core competencies and financial and human resources available in the health sector (including unique knowledge, skill sets, experiences, and established trust) provide a compelling, yet mostly untapped opportunity to help create and sustain the enabling conditions necessary to achieve the goals and targets of the framework. While by no means a panacea for the world's biodiversity problems, we posit that explicitly omitting the health sector from the Post-2020 GBF substantially weakens the global, collective effort to catalyze the transformative changes required to safeguard biodiversity.

Changing climate, challenging choices: identifying and evaluating climate change adaptation options for protected areas management in Ontario, Canada.

Climate change will pose increasingly significant challenges to managers of parks and other forms of protected areas around the world. Over the past two decades, numerous scientific publications have identified potential adaptations, but their suitability from legal, policy, financial, internal capacity, and other management perspectives has not been evaluated for any protected area agency or organization. In this study, a panel of protected area experts applied a Policy Delphi methodology to identify and evaluate climate change adaptation options across the primary management areas of a protected area agency in Canada. The panel identified and evaluated one hundred and sixty five (165) adaptation options for their perceived desirability and feasibility. While the results revealed a high level of agreement with respect to the desirability of adaptation options and a moderate level of capacity pertaining to policy formulation and management direction, a perception of low capacity for implementation in most other program areas was identified. A separate panel of senior park agency decision-makers used a multiple criterion decision-facilitation matrix to further evaluate the institutional feasibility of the 56 most desirable adaptation options identified by the initial expert panel and to prioritize them for consideration in a climate change action plan. Critically, only two of the 56 adaptation options evaluated by senior decision-makers were deemed definitely implementable, due largely to fiscal and internal capacity limitations. These challenges are common to protected area agencies in developed countries and pervade those in developing countries, revealing that limited adaptive capacity represents a substantive barrier to biodiversity conservation and other protected area management objectives in an era of rapid climate change.

Tracking human activity and well-being in natural environments using wearable sensors and experience sampling.

A growing range of studies have begun to document the health and well-being benefits associated with contact with nature. Most studies rely on generalized self-reports following engagement in the natural environment. The actual in-situ experience during contact with nature, and the environmental features and factors that evoke health benefits have remained relatively unexplored. Smartphones offer a new opportunity to monitor and interact with human subjects during everyday life using techniques such as Experience Sampling Methods (ESM) that involve repeated self-reports of experiences as they occur in-situ. Additionally, embedded sensors in smartphones such as Global Positioning Systems (GPS) and accelerometers can accurately trace human activities. This paper explores how these techniques can be combined to comprehensively explore the perceived health and well-being impacts of contact with nature. Custom software was developed to passively track GPS and accelerometer data, and actively prompt subjects to complete an ESM survey at regular intervals throughout their visit to a provincial park in Ontario, Canada. The ESM survey includes nine scale questions concerning moods and emotions, followed by a series of open-ended experiential questions that subjects provide recorded audio responses to. Pilot test results are used to illustrate the nature, quantity and quality of data obtained. Participant activities were clearly evident from GPS maps, including especially walking, cycling and sedate activities. From the ESM surveys, participants reported an average of 25 words per question, taking an average of 15 s to record them. Further qualitative analysis revealed that participants were willing to provide considerable insights into their experiences and perceived health impacts. The combination of passive and interactive techniques is sure to make larger studies of this type more affordable and less burdensome in the future, further enhancing the ability to understand how contact with nature enhances health and well-being.