58 



from other very different ministries or have had no in-service 

 training in the last 20 years. Technical training can take 

 many forms, from low-cost field-based on-the-job training to 

 university or post-graduate education. Efforts made to 

 [ romote training at any of these levels will certainly produce 

 conservation results. 



Participation can also be enhanced by fostering the 

 development and strengthening of conservation-oriented non- 

 governmental organizations . Although religious and 

 cooperative organizations have a richer history, in most 

 African countries environmental NGOs are only recently- 

 organized and few in number. To provide an alternative 

 vehicle for popular participation in conservation, 

 encouragement should be provided for such nascent NGOs, as 

 well as the adoption of conservation issues by non- 

 environmental groups. 



Finally, all natural resource management and conservation programs 

 should aim toward biological, socio-economic, and programmatic 

 sustainabi 1 i ty 



Clearly, conservation practices should lead to sustainable 

 natural systems , able to maintain biological diversity and/or 

 ecological/biological productivity or services. Such systems 

 should also be acceptable to local people and national 

 governments, and help if possible to meet social and economic 

 needs . 



Conservation programs themselves must also be sustainable : 

 they must have the support of an informed and enfranchised 

 public; they must be staffed by trained and motivated 

 personnel, with systems for continued training; and they must 

 be designed to be affordable. This latter point requires that 

 costs of conservation programs be recovered or compensated for 

 by benefits derived from the activities themselves, or that 

 external contributory mechanisms be designed (endowments, 

 trust funds, taxes). This implies that unless external inputs 

 are guaranteed throughout the indefinite future, then on-going 

 program systems should be designed to be low-cost, practical, 

 and self-sustaining. Assistance should be administered with 

 this in mind. 



The Role of the United States Government 



Recently, efforts of the Wildlife Conservation Society have 

 involved frequent collaboration with USAID, through grants and 

 cooperative agreements, in African projects addressing conservation 

 and its interface with local and national development. Having 

 worked directly on these projects over the years, I would like to 



