WHAT SHOULD PARK MANAGERS DO TO ADAPT TO CLIMATE CHANGE?

Change is happening and will continue to happen at a rate akin to the great climate changes and extinctions of the geological past. Protected areas must be managed accordingly. Managers cannot stop these global threats, but they can adapt policies and strategies to facilitate natural resilience for biodiversity, geodiversity and self-sustaining populations of native plants and animals. Some principles, goals and actions were suggested by Welch (2005). The principles follow.

Principles
House-in-order and public communications. High profile public agencies have a unique opportunity to explain global change issues to a wide citizenry through interpretation and outreach. House-in-order and demonstration projects add credibility. Examples include the elimination of cosmetic pesticide use, reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and waste reduction and recycling.

Risk management to foster resilience. Some species and ecosystems may be able to adapt to climate change by migration or in situ change. However, there are many other stresses impinging on natural areas and their greater ecosystems. A risk management approach will reduce or eliminate these confounding stresses through collaborative efforts.

Focus on mandate, complement with partnerships. Tourism, regional development and foreign policy should not be put ahead of restoring and protecting natural and cultural heritage. Priority should be accorded to actions within the direct responsibility of the agency and its staff. So, for example, ecological integrity must supercede carbon sequestration in protected ecosystems. However, to the extent that resources allow and that its prime mandate is respected, a park should cooperate in activities like education, emission reduction, climate science and landscape stewardship.

Permeable landscapes. Parks should be part of networks of ecological areas within which biodiversity can survive, move and be appreciated. Park agencies should promote the importance of regional ecosystems characterized by connectivity and permeable for wildlife movement.

Actions
These principles can be applied through five types of action, together forming the acronym ALARM.

Awareness: staff and stakeholder orientation; visitor interpretation and outreach to the general public.

Leading by example: reduce greenhouse gas emissions; promote personal action plans for staff; adapt natural region representation strategy; address climate change adaptation in management plans; report on natural and management adaptations to climate change.

Active ecosystem management: eliminate or mitigate in situ non-climate threats; apply adaptive management; use science results; adjust park boundaries as needed for climate change adaptation.

Research: understand the impact of past and future climate change; identify values at risk of being significantly impacted by climate change; support downscaled climate modelling.

Monitoring: promote parks as long term integrated monitoring sites; data gathering and reporting.

Goals
Specific actions should be phased to achieve three targets. The actions don’t need to be sequential.

Short term: appropriate climate change information is available to all aspects of park management.

Mid-term: climate change is factored into all aspects of ecosystem and asset management, and duly reflected in park management plans.

Long-term: natural areas are nested within regional landscapes that are permeable for the movement of native species and which are free of significant threats to ecological integrity.

REFERENCES
Welch D. What should protected areas managers do in the face of climate change? George Wright Forum 2005; 22(1):75-93.
Similar ideas appear in a 2004 IUCN report “Climate change and nature - adapting for the future,” undated, available online at www.iucn.org/themes/climate/publications.htm

David Welch, Parks Canada