Lack of benefit sharing undermines support for nature conservation in an Eastern Afromontane biodiversity hotspot

Successful forest conservation in the tropics depends on various biophysical, socioeconomic, cultural, and political factors. Researchers, environmental practitioners, and local people recognize the need to resolve longstanding systemic weaknesses in environmental governance institutions, to make mainstream environmental policy and action, and to find locally informed and adaptive conservation measures. This also applies to the preservation of cloud-forest fragments of the Taita Hills in southern Kenya, a section of the Afromontane biodiversity hotspot. These forest remnants host many endemic and endangered plant and animal species, and suffer under deforestation and forest degradation. We conducted structured surveys with 300 smallholder farmers living around three forest fragments in the Taita Hills. Our results indicate a lack of knowledge about biodiversity and ecosystem functions among local people. We found an inverse relationship between the level of formal education and practical environmental knowledge, and a bias toward the protection of plant species, because of their provisional ecosystem services, as opposed to the protection of wild animals, because they are mainly associated with human-wildlife conflicts and large-scale tourism. Unresolved human-wildlife conflicts and missing benefit sharing from tourism has created an anti-conservation attitude. Our study underlines that nature conservation is only feasible if the local people benefit from it in the medium and long terms, and if the added value of conservation for high human-livelihood quality is clearly communicated.

Automated summary

Successful forest conservation in the tropics depends on addressing weaknesses in environmental governance, implementing locally informed conservation measures, and ensuring benefits for local people. Our study in the Taita Hills of Kenya highlights the lack of knowledge about biodiversity and ecosystem functions among local people, and the bias towards protecting plant species rather than wild animals due to conflicts and tourism. Resolving human-wildlife conflicts and sharing tourism benefits are crucial for promoting a positive attitude towards conservation.