The conservation challenge in sustaining rural environments

The focus of this paper is on obstacles to conservation and specific conservation initiatives. While policy makers are influenced by the social constructions of rural and while there is unlikely to be common agreement on what is rural, convergences can occur on the most efficacious approaches towards conservation through widening communities of knowledge achieved by greater efforts to evaluate strategies and to share experiences from different localities. The paper begins with a brief conceptualization of the trade-offs involved between commodity and non-commodity uses of rural lands. A more elaborate discussion follows of the dominant factors which undermine conservation of rural environments. In the face of these obstacles the paper examines a wide variety of strategies and actions from OECD countries to provide a better balance between commodity and non-commodity functions. Although governments are expected to continue to play an important leadership, policy setting and regulatory role, it is clear from the examples presented in this paper that many important initiatives are coming from non-governmental organizations and that partnerships between public and private sectors and between private and non-governmental sectors have significant potential to clarify issues, to establish common ground and galvanize constructive action.