Limitations of outsourcing on-the-ground biodiversity conservation

• Published in: Conservation biology 2016-12, Vol.30 (6), p.1245-1254
• Main Authors: Iacona, Gwenllian D., Bode, Michael, Armsworth, Paul R.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Biodiversity; Conservation; conservation finance; Conservation of Natural Resources; crowding out; efecto desplazamiento; Endangered & extinct species; equilibrio de Nash; financiamiento de la conservación; game theory; hierarchical organization interactions; interacciones de la organización jerárquica; Nash equilibrium; Organizations; Outsourced Services; Resource Allocation; teoría de juegos
• ISSN: 0888-8892; 1523-1739
• DOI: 10.1111/cobi.12739

To counteract global species decline, modern biodiversity conservation engages in large projects, spends billions of dollars, and includes many organizations working simultaneously within regions. To add to this complexity, the conservation sector has hierarchical structure, where conservation actions are often outsourced byfunders (foundations, government, etc.) to local organizations that work on-the-ground. In contrast, conservation science usually assumes that a single organization makes resource allocation decisions. This discrepancy calls for theory to understand how the expected biodiversity outcomes change when interactions between organizations are accounted for. Here, we used a game theoretic model to explore how biodiversity outcomes are affected by vertical and horizontal interactions between 3 conservation organizations: afunder that outsourced its actions and 2 local conservation organizations that work on-the-ground. Interactions between the organizations changed the spending decisions made by individual organizations, and thereby the magnitude and direction of the conservation benefits. We showed thatfunders would struggle to incentivize recipient organizations with set priorities to perform desired actions, even when they control substantial amounts of the funding and employ common contracting approaches to enhance outcomes. Instead, biodiversity outcomes depended on priority alignment across the organizations. Conservation outcomes for thefunder were improved by strategic interactions when organizational priorities were well aligned, but decreased when priorities were misaligned. Meanwhile, local organizations had improved outcomes regardless of alignment due to additional funding in the system. Given that conservation often involves the aggregate actions of multiple organizations with different objectives, strategic interactions between organizations need to be considered if we are to predict possible outcomes of conservation programs or costs of achieving conservation targets. La conservación moderna de la biodiversidad involucra grandes proyectos y el gasto de miles de millones de dólares, e incluye a muchas organizaciones trabajando simultáneamente. Estas acciones de conservación son subcontratadas comúnmente a organizaciones locales por los fmandadores (fundaciones, gobierno, etc.) La discrepancia entre esta complejidad en el sector y la suposición común en las ciencias de la conservación de que una única organización toma decisiones