Communicating Biodiversity to Private Forest Owners

This 5-page slide presentation for the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)/the World Conservation Union (IUCN)/the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund (CEPF) Workshop in Zamardi, Hungary, in September 2004, discusses government communication, non-governmental organisation (NGO) communication, and how to create synergies through communication that result in biodiversity conservation.

In the government portion of the presentation the author suggests that the problematic nature of communication from behind a desk using memos results in the use of a "decide-announce-defend" communication strategy that assumes the need to educate an ill-informed public, although with few budget resources available. The strategy he recommends is communication through all phases of identifying needed policies, formulating them, implementing them, and managing them.


He introduces the potential for NGOs to function as intermediaries between government and citizens groups because they can use informal communication, associate more closely with citizens' groups, and appear as credible sources of information. The presentation turns to forest owners associations (PFOs) stating that communication will help move them away from being groups with small representation and resources and with ambiguity towards and from the government to organisations with capacity development, representation in new legislation and networking capacities, as well as ongoing projects and strategic partnerships.


The author then examines how to carry messages to forest owners on biodiversity conservation through mass media. He uses three countries' experiences, where recent privatisation of large portions of forests has led to new roles of NGOs and civil society, to illustrate some strategies: Estonia, Lithuania, and Hungary. Recent strategies in these forests are: introduction of new ways to manage the forest (introduction of innovation); innovators (pioneers) who have success working with government to set the national agenda; small seminars, field trips, and a 'helpdesk' for innovators, run as a public-private partnership between the government and PFOs. His analysis of what does not work well includes: managers focusing on media with an idea to capture the imagination; convincing people individually, without a wider focus on the social environment; and content and messages that are secondary and cannot answer "why or what questions". in conclusion, he cites the following as strategic interventions in the social system that can trigger change: managers analysing the social system and planning strategically to achieve desired outcomes; interventions focused on specific goals goals (audiences and messages determine the media); and selected audiences participating in planning, with interventions based on their values.