Abstract
Major developments, such as mines, will often have unavoidable environmental impacts. In such cases, investors, governments, or even a company's own standards increasingly require implementation of biodiversity offsets (investment in conservation with a measurable outcome) with the aim of achieving 'no net loss' or even a 'net gain' of biodiversity. Where conservation is achieved by changing the behaviour of people directly using natural resources, the offset might be expected to have social impacts but such impacts have received very little attention. Using the case study of Ambatovy, a major nickel mine in the eastern rainforests of Madagascar and a company at the vanguard of developing biodiversity offsets, we explore local perceptions of the magnitude and distribution of impacts of the biodiversity offset project on local wellbeing. We used both qualitative (key informant interviews and focus group discussions) and quantitative (household survey) methods. We found that the biodiversity offsets, which comprise both conservation restrictions and development activities, influenced wellbeing in a mixture of positive and negative ways. However, overall, respondents felt that they had suffered a net cost from the biodiversity offset. It is a matter of concern that benefits from development activities do not compensate for the costs of the conservation restrictions, that those who bear the costs are not the same people as those who benefit, and that there is a mismatch in timing between the immediate restrictions and the associated development activities which take some time to deliver benefits. These issues matter both from the perspective of environmental justice, and for the long-term sustainability of the biodiversity benefits the offset is supposed to deliver.
Highlights
Biodiversity offsets are a new mechanism which aim to compensate for any residual impacts of an infrastructure2 / Bidaud et al.project on the environment (McKenney and Kiesecker 2010), allowing economically important development to go ahead while ensuring that biodiversity and ecosystem services are conserved (Gardner et al 2013b)
We argue that there are two important reasons why social issues need to be more carefully considered in the design of biodiversity offset schemes such as Ambatovy: 1) because of concern for environmental justice and 2) for pragmatic reasons concerned with success in delivering biodiversity benefits long term
We have highlighted the experiences of people living alongside a biodiversity offset project in Madagascar as a mixture of the sweet and bitter: intertwined positive and negative impacts on wellbeing
Summary
Biodiversity offsets are a new mechanism which aim to compensate for any residual impacts of an infrastructure2 / Bidaud et al.project on the environment (after efforts have been made to minimise them as far as possible) (McKenney and Kiesecker 2010), allowing economically important development to go ahead while ensuring that biodiversity and ecosystem services are conserved (Gardner et al 2013b). Developed initially as a voluntary initiative in high income countries (ten Kate et al 2004), this mechanism is rapidly being taken up around the world where major investments have the potential to have negative impacts on the environment. Discussion about the advantages and disadvantages of the approach focuses mostly on the calculation, methods and rationale of measuring biodiversity loss and gains (Virah-Sawmy et al 2014; Watson et al 2010; Temple et al 2012; Curran et al 2014; Neimark and Wilson 2015; Moreno-Mateos et al 2015; Maron et al 2015; Quétier and Lavorel 2011; Walker et al 2009; Bidaud et al 2015) with relatively little focus so far on social issues (Benabou 2014). The limited social research on biodiversity offsets mainly considers case studies in the US or the UK (Sullivan and Hannis 2015; Hannis and Sullivan 2012; Robertson 2004) with very few case studies in developing countries (Seagle 2012; Kraemer 2012)
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