Equity in outcomes
Predator Free Wellington isn’t just on a mission to make Wellington the world’s first predator free capital city – we also want to make people’s lives better.
Our eradication work on Miramar Peninsula has involveed residents across the community from a diverse range of backgrounds.
Unfortunately, this isn’t always the case. Community participation in ecological projects, such as predator eradication, tends to be uneven across different sectors of society and is predominantly from white ethnic groups, highly educated, affluent and middle aged or older (Hart et al., 2022). In Wellington, Dr Danielle Shanahan demonstrated that participation in ecological projects was associated with economic advantage (Shanahan, 2020).
In July 2022, Dr Julie Whitburn and Dr Danielle Shanahan presented our efforts on Miramar as an exemple of a collective, landscape-scale predator eradication project, a project that amplifies the work of community-led projects already operating (read full report here).
To completely eradicate predators, no neighbourhood on the peninsula could be overlooked. This has likely driven a more equitable approach to community participation in the project and more equal ecological or social outcomes.
The researchers explored whether equity existed in this dimension of the project on Miramar by looking at the relationship between neighbourhood advantage, tree canopy cover (showing existing ecological inequity) and landholders’ participation in the project.
They found our Miramar Peninsula eradication achieved equitable deployment of traps and bait stations across the landscape, irrespective of the socio-economic context or the amount of tree canopy cover in neighbourhoods. This is an uncommon occurrence with social imbalances in environmental outcomes common globally (Hart et al., 2022).
The researchers noted our targeted strategy to engage community environmental groups as collaborative partners, and a tailored engagement strategy to have landholders participate within each community, were key features that helped facilitate these equitable outcomes. These approaches may also lead to equitable improvements in biodiversity over time.
Why does equity in conservation matter?
Equitable participation in our project means that the ecological and wellbeing benefits are not limited to particular sectors of society. This includes rat free homes or increased wildlife, and potential benefits of participating, such as improvements to people’s psychological and social wellbeing.
We hope that lessons from this research will improve large-scale community engagement in ecological restoration projects locally, nationally and internationally. The strategies used to interweave technical expertise and community engagement could be applied to other ‘wicked’ problems that require a systems approach, such as developing a regional response to address aspects of climate change which could culminate in community-wide behaviour change.
Acknowledgment: Dr Julie Whitburn’s research was funded by the Bioheritage National Science Challenge and Predator Free Wellington Ltd.
Posted: 30 August 2022