Strengthening the Weakest Links:

1
Strengthening the Weakest Links An Innovative
Approach to Enforcement Conservation
International Center for Conservation and
Government Enforcement Initiative Anita Sundari
Akella December 2004
2
Why Enforcement?
Why Enforcement?

• Enforcement of PA boundaries, natural resource
  use rules and regulations is weak
• Illegal timber trade 150 billion per year
• Illegal fishing 30 of total catches
• Illegal wildlife trade 6 7 billion per year
• Innovative conservation strategies are stronger
  with good enforcement
• Ecosystem Services Payments
• Tradable Development Rights
• PA Creation

3
What Are Conservationists Doing About It?

• Solutions are ad-hoc and often limited to
  individual sites
• No methodical analysis of why enforcement is weak
• No comparison across sites to draw global lessons
  learned

4
Conventional Wisdom on Enforcement

• Hire and equip more detection agents
• Raise fines

These strategies, in isolation, are not working!
5
Enforcement An Economic Perspective

• Illegal activity is fundamentally an economic
  issue
• To deter it, disincentives must be bigger than
  incentives driving illegal activity
• Enforcement is also an economic issue

6
Innovation The Enforcement Economics Approach

• ED Pd Pad Ppa Pcp Penalty e-rt

Where ED Enforcement Disincentive Pd
Probability of detection Pad Probability of
arrest given detection Ppa Probability of
prosecution given arrest Pcp Probability of
conviction given prosecution e-rt discount
factor t Time between detection and penalty
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Risky Business?
Only 1 of crimes result in a conviction
8
Applying the theory in practice

• Bahia, Brazil Illegal logging, illegal
  deforestation
• Selva Maya, Mexico Illegal wildlife trade
• Palawan, Philippines Cyanide/Dynamite fishing
• Papua, Indonesia Illegal logging, illegal
  wildlife trade

9
Atlantic Forest BAHIA, BRASIL
Incentives to illegally log or deforest
75.00 Enforcement Disincentive 6.44
10
Selva Maya CHIAPAS, MEXICO
Incentives to Illegally Hunt/Trade Wildlife
191.57 Enforcement Disincentive 5.66
11
Papua Province INDONESIA
Incentives to Illegally Ship Timber
91,967.36 Enforcement Disincentive 6.47
12
Calamianes Islands PALAWAN, PHILIPPINES
Calamianes Islands PALAWAN, PHILIPPINES
Incentives to Dynamite/Cyanide Fish
70.57 Enforcement Disincentive 0.09
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What does this mean for conservation?

• For complex reasons, enforcement is abysmal in
  many of the countries where we work.
• Less than 1 of environmental crimes result in
  any penalty whatsoever.
• When it comes to the environment, CRIME PAYS!

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Key Challenges

• Interagency cooperation across enforcement chain
• Adequate budgetary resources
• Consistent performance monitoring and adaptive
  management system for all agencies
• Regular, ongoing capacity-building programs,
  jointly developed
• Strong, clear and adequate laws and policies

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Priority Reform Enforcement Policy

• Increase budget allocation to environmental
  enforcement agencies across the chain
• Strengthen, clarify, and consolidate legislation
• Establish guidelines for inter-agency cooperation
  and annual performance reporting
• Create the legal framework for alternative
  enforcement systems to operate

16
Priority Implement Adaptive Management

• Develop standardized data management systems for
  use across agencies
• Reach agreement on enforcement statistics
  (indicators) to be produced annually
• Train key staff in use of enforcement economics
  methodology to analyze statistics and develop
  strategic enforcement strengthening plans
• Require annual publication (public disclosure) of
  enforcement performance report

17
Priority Build Enforcement Capacity

• Improve performance of detection agents,
  prosecutors and judges through periodic training
• Involve all agencies in the process of designing
  curricula for each audience
• Take advantage of existing technical assistance
  partnerships with donor government agencies
• Incorporate specialized local NGOs, think tanks
  and institutes